Cashback and clawback
The cashback gets advertised. The clawback period doesn't.
Three numbers decide what a cashback is worth to you: the cashback the bank advertises, the clawback period that comes attached, and the switch cashback they'll only pay if you ask. Answer a few questions here and your results page puts all three on your own balance.
If you already have a mortgage, the third number is probably the place to start. One borrower's own bank offered about $1,500 to stay, and banks that had never met them offered about $6,000. The difference was asking, and the full account is further down this page.
How it works
It isn't a gift. It's a payment with a leash on it.
The lender pays the cash on settlement, and a clawback period comes attached. If you leave inside that period, you repay some or all of the money. The reason is plain when you look at it from the bank's side: a mortgage earns the bank interest for decades, provided you stay, and the clawback period is how the bank makes sure the cheque it wrote on day one pays for itself. You're not being given money. You're being paid to stay, and the clawback period is the length of the leash. Further down this page you can measure yours.
All six of the biggest mortgage sites in New Zealand promote the cashback. The word "clawback" appears on none of them. (Category scrape, 11 September 2026.) This page exists because the second number belongs beside the first.
“If you're offered 0.1%, 0.7% or even 1% of your mortgage balance as a ‘cashback’, you may wonder what the catch is, given banks are not known for their generosity.”
MoneyHub, an independent NZ money guide that is not selling you a mortgage.
MoneyHub also ran the comparison almost nobody in this category runs. Here is its own worked example over three years:
| Monthly repayment | Total over 3 years | Cashback | Total cost of borrowing | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lender A, no cashback | $2,503 | $90,108 | $0 | $90,108 |
| Lender B, with cashback | $2,681 | $96,516 | $3,500 | $93,016 |
The cashback lender charges $178 more a month. Over three years that comes to $6,408, which swallows the $3,500 and leaves the borrower $2,908 worse off. In MoneyHub's example the higher repayment comes from a higher rate, and the cash was the sweetener on the dearer loan; when the rates match, a cashback is straight money in your favour. That is not an argument against taking one. It is an argument for seeing the cash and the cost on one page before you sign. The questions tool further down puts the cash side on your own balance, and the rate side is exactly what a licensed adviser prices before you sign anything. (The example is MoneyHub's, and the numbers and assumptions are theirs, cited as published.)
The table
What each lender pays, and how long they want you to stay.
Are you switching rather than buying? These advertised offers are mostly first-home-buyer offers. Your number is the negotiated one, it has its own section just below, and your results page leads with it.Skip to your number
| Lender | Advertised cashback | Clawback period | What the terms say |
|---|---|---|---|
| ANZ | $5,000 for first home buyers on a new loan of $200,000 or more. | 3 years | Conditional on staying with ANZ for at least three years. How it reduces over that time is not published. |
| ASB | $5,000 for first home buyers, loan drawn in full at settlement. ASB may offer a reduced amount, at its discretion, to people who have owned before. | 3 years | Refinance, repay or end the loan within 36 months — including a mortgagee sale — and a pro-rata portion is repayable, "as determined by ASB". |
| BNZ | Minimum $5,000 for first home buyers on $250,000 or more, deposits from 5%. Parent-assisted lending over 25% of the loan is excluded. | 3 years | Published steps: leave inside year one and 100% is repayable, year two 66%, year three 33%, then nothing. A mortgagee sale counts as leaving. |
| Westpac | $5,000 or more for first home buyers on $250,000 or more. Needs 20% equity and your salary paid into a Westpac account. | Not published | Westpac does not publish its clawback period. We read the current Choices home loan terms and it is not in there either — it is in your loan agreement. |
| Kiwibank | $5,000 or more for first home buyers borrowing $250,000 or more for an owner-occupied home. | 4 years | Four years — and it is a relationship condition, not just a loan one. Move your salary out or refinance inside the period and Kiwibank "may require you to repay some or all" of it. |
| The Co-operative Bank | 1% of the loan, up to $15,000, for first home buyers over $250,000 with a 20% deposit — or 5% with a Kāinga Ora First Home Loan. | 3 years | Repayable pro-rata by month across 36 months. Their own worked example: leave after 12 months and you repay two-thirds. Substantially repaying the loan inside 12 months can also trigger it. |
| SBS Bank | FirstHome Combo: $2,000 cash, plus $1,000 towards SBS house and contents insurance and $1,000 towards an SBS KiwiSaver account — each with its own conditions — plus a rate discount. | 4 years | The $2,000 is repayable "based on the amount of time left" if the loan leaves inside four years. The two $1,000 payments have separate 12-month insurance and KiwiSaver conditions. |
| Unity | 1.25% of the loan, up to $15,000, for first home buyers from $250,000 with 20% equity — or with a Kāinga Ora First Home Loan. | Not published | The repayment period sits in the cash contribution terms, not on the offer page. Ask for it in writing before you draw down. |
| TSB | No published cashback offer found on TSB’s material as at October 2026. | — | Nothing published to verify. Any negotiated cashback will carry its period in the loan agreement. |
We collected these from each lender's published material, most recently on 23 October 2026. Each lender sets its own criteria, including minimum loan size and minimum fixed term, and every one of them says the offer can be withdrawn without notice. The table is dated because the offers move; check the current terms with your lender before relying on anything here.
Why some cells are blank. Westpac's clawback period is not in its published material; we read the current Choices home loan terms and it is not there either. Unity's sits in a terms document the offer page doesn't carry. TSB publishes no cashback offer at all. We'd rather show a blank than guess. The period that binds you is written in your loan agreement, and the lender will tell you if you ask. As above: a blank is a blank, not a zero.
A flat $3,000 and 1% of the loan are not comparable numbers.Advertised amounts move between a flat first-home figure and a percentage of the loan. Read the wording, not just the dollar sign.
Would you rather see every one of these on your own balance, with the clawback period beside each one? See my results ↑
The negotiated number
No bank advertises a switch cashback. Brokers put it at 0.80% to 0.90%.
Brokers report roughly 0.80% to 0.90% of the loan as standard for a switch (Squirrel, 26 November 2025). On a $500,000 loan that comes to $4,000 to $4,500. The number is negotiated, which means asked for: no bank prints it, and like every cashback it is conditional, it carries a clawback period, and it can be withdrawn without notice.
One borrower published what the asking looked like. Their rates were rolling over, so they asked a broker to put their own bank's retention offer against what new lenders would pay. Their own bank offered about $1,500 to stay; banks that had never met them offered about $6,000. It is one account, not an average, and here it is verbatim.
“Our rates were coming up for renewal so we asked our broker to compare a Westpac cash-back with new lenders. WP offered a paltry $1500-ish. […] Major Bank #1 offered ~$6k cash back […] Kiwibank was more chill: had NO conditions but also offered ~$6k cash back”
r/PersonalFinanceNZ, 15 October 2025.
What moved those numbers was the asking. None of those offers was advertised anywhere, and in that account, staying put without asking would have left about $4,500 behind. Asking costs nothing, and you can walk into that conversation with the whole table already in your hand.
Your own number
Every advertised offer on your balance, plus the number you can only get by asking.
A few answers put every lender's advertised offer on your balance, with the clawback period sitting beside each one. If you're switching, your results open with the negotiated side of the market first, the offers that exist because somebody asked, with the advertised offers as context underneath. If a cashback came with your current loan, you also see what leaving would claw back and the date that period ends.
- You answer a few questions about the loan. None of them asks who you are.
- Your results page renders the whole market on your balance: every offer the banks advertise, and the negotiated one they only pay when someone asks.
- If you want to act on any of it, the results page can match you with one licensed adviser. One means one: not a list, not a panel, and your details go to nobody else. You make that call there, not here.
See my results ↑The questions sit at the top of this page, and they take about a minute.
Where a lender publishes its clawback method (ASB, BNZ, The Co-operative Bank, SBS), the tool uses it. Where it doesn't, you get the amount at risk and the date, not an invented formula. Your lender's own figure is the one that counts, and nothing here is a quote or advice.
Questions
Fair questions.
What is clawback?
The cash a lender pays you on settlement comes with a clawback period attached. If you leave inside it, some or all of that cash is repayable. We publish the period for each lender we have been able to read it from, and we say so where we haven’t.
Is a cashback worth taking?
That depends on numbers only you and a licensed adviser can put together, so here is arithmetic instead of an opinion: in MoneyHub’s published worked example, a $3,500 cashback left the borrower $2,908 worse off over three years, and the whole gap sat in the rate on the dearer loan. When the rates match, a cashback is straight money in your favour. The full example is further up this page. The questions tool puts the cash side on your own balance, and the rate side is what a licensed adviser prices before you sign anything.
How much cashback would I get for switching banks?
The percentage offers you may have seen, The Co-operative Bank’s 1% up to $15,000 and Unity’s 1.25% up to $15,000, are first-home-buyer offers, not switch offers. No bank advertises a number for switchers. A switch cashback is negotiated, which means asked for. Brokers report roughly 0.80% to 0.90% of the loan as standard for a switch (Squirrel, 26 November 2025), so $4,000–$4,500 on a $500,000 loan. Tell the questions tool you’re switching and your results page leads with that negotiated number, with the advertised offers as context underneath. Every figure is conditional, every one carries a clawback period, and all of them can be withdrawn without notice.
What is a break fee, and will I have one?
If you exit a fixed rate early, your lender may charge an early repayment adjustment. It is calculated from wholesale rates rather than advertised ones, it differs by lender, and the figure moves day to day. It is largest when rates have fallen since you fixed, and MoneyHub notes it “may be very small or zero” when they have risen. It is separate from clawback, and a move can trigger both. A licensed adviser prices this before you commit to anything.
Why are some of your clawback periods blank?
We couldn’t verify them from the lender’s own published material, and a wrong claim about a named bank is the worst error a site like this can make. So the cell stays empty and says so. The period that binds you is in your loan agreement, and your lender will confirm it if you ask.
Is this financial advice?
No. We publish what each lender advertises and what its terms say, and we do the arithmetic on it. Advice is the licensed adviser’s job. If you choose to be matched with one on your results page, they will give you their disclosure information before any advising starts, and nothing on this page commits you to that.
Both numbers, before you sign anything.
A few answers put every advertised offer on your balance, the clawback period beside each one, and, if a cashback came with your current loan, what leaving would claw back. The adviser decision waits until you've seen your numbers.
See my results ↑The questions sit at the top of this page, and they take about a minute.