The self-employed lending challenge
If you're self-employed, you already know the frustration. You earn well, your business is profitable, your lifestyle reflects your success — but the bank looks at your tax returns and sees a different picture. Because you've legitimately minimised your taxable income (as any good accountant would advise), the income the bank sees is lower than the income you actually earn.
This is the core problem with self-employed lending at most mainstream lenders. They're built for PAYG borrowers, and they apply PAYG assessment criteria to everyone.
How lenders assess self-employed income
Most lenders use your last two years of tax returns, averaged, to determine your income. For many self-employed borrowers this significantly understates actual earnings — particularly if your accountant has legitimately used depreciation, trust distributions or other structures to reduce taxable income.
Some lenders offer alternative documentation options — sometimes called low doc or alt doc — where you can use accountant declarations, BAS statements or business bank statements to support your income. These lenders understand that a tax return doesn't tell the full story.
The specialist broker difference
A specialist broker who works regularly with self-employed borrowers knows which lenders will look beyond the tax return, how to present add-backs correctly, which lenders allow BAS-based income verification, and how to position a complex income structure for the best outcome.
They also know which lenders will decline before you waste time applying — protecting your credit file from unnecessary hard enquiries.
What to bring to your first conversation
Two years of personal tax returns and notices of assessment, two years of business tax returns and financials, your most recent BAS statements (ideally 12 months), business bank statements (3–6 months), and an overview of your business structure — sole trader, company, trust or partnership.
The more complete your picture from the start, the better we can match you with the right lender and structure your application for success.