The major wants to lend more than $60 billion to developers and first home buyers.
National Australia Bank (NAB) has outlined plans to provide at least $60 billion in financing by 2030 to boost housing supply and support first home buyers.
In an open letter to customers, government and developers, NAB CEO Andrew Irvine today (30 October) announced the bank’s plans to increase financing towards housing.
NAB will lend $30 billion to boost the supply of commercial real estate development projects where the use is mainly residential, along with specialist accommodation including build-to-rent, student accommodation, land lease and community housing.
It will also provide $30 billion in financing to support first home buyers via the Australian Government's 5 per cent Deposit Scheme.
The major claimed it wanted to “help address Australia’s housing crisis” and that the financing could support around 55,000 loans for first home buyers and the development of about 50,000 new homes.
“Housing is Australia’s biggest societal and policy challenge,” Irvine said.
“We are not building enough homes to provide access to housing for all Australians, let alone achieve the dream of home ownership.”
Banks push on proprietary lending
NAB has ramped up its efforts to drive mortgage growth, announcing last year that it would focus on proprietary lending to improve shareholder returns while increasing investment in the channel.
Earlier this year CEO Andrew Irvine reiterated this, hailing a 25 per cent year-on-year increase in new proprietary mortgages (excluding NAB-owned UBank home lending) to $16.6 billion.
The proportion of new loans written by the proprietary channel was up 14.1 per cent over the year to March (from 35.4 per cent to 40.4 per cent).
It onboarded around 150 new proprietary home lenders during 1H25 in a bid to support further improved performance.
Earlier this week, the Australian Financial Review reported that NAB is also changing how it measures lending targets for some of its private bankers by increasing the focus on proprietary mortgages, while dramatically reducing the contribution of broker-introduced home loans towards targets.
In a statement to The Adviser, NAB Executive for private wealth Michael Saadie, said: “NAB takes a balanced approach to colleague scorecards, which include financial, customer and risk outcomes.
“We update colleague scorecards annually to ensure they’re aligned to the bank’s priorities in the coming year. NAB Private Wealth is a unique offering, with a 1,200 strong team supporting high net worth clients across wealth advisory, private banking and investment services.
“We continue to support customers through a range of channels, including directly via our team and brokers.”
NAB's private wealth arm has been focused on growing its proportional contribution to proprietary home lending in recent years.
All four majors have been leaning into the more lucrative proprietary lending space and pulling back growth from the broker channel, which writes a record 77.6 per cent of new mortgages (as at June quarter 2025, according to Mortgage and Finance Association of Australia (MFAA) data).
Earlier this month, Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) CEO Nuno Matos outlined plans to expand mortgage and business lending, including the addition of 50 per cent more mortgage lenders inside its branches.
The changes will likely grow returns from ANZ’s proprietary lending arm and could reduce reliance on mortgage brokers.
The Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s (CBA) 2025 financial results revealed that its focus on proprietary mortgage lending had resulted in falling broker flows and a dominating proprietary channel.
Last month, Westpac laid out plans to remove around 200 roles in telling and personal banking, while recruiting for home and small business lending by the same number.
The move by the majors has been met with scorn by the broking industry, including Finance Brokers Association of Australia (FBAA) MD Peter White, who claimed earlier this month that “big banks hate competition”.
[Related: Big banks hate competition, says FBAA head]
