The Home Equity Access Scheme (HEAS) is a voluntary loan from the Commonwealth Government that lets eligible older Australians borrow against Australian real estate they already own. Services Australia runs it — not a bank or private lender — and how much you can draw is capped against the Age Pension rate rather than assessed on your income the way a private loan is. You don’t sell any part of your home to use it; instead, compounding interest builds on whatever you draw.

HEAS sits alongside private options like reverse mortgages, home reversion and selling a fractional interest in a property. This guide covers HEAS on its own terms — who can get it, how much it pays, and what it costs — using the figures Services Australia publishes, before situating it among those alternatives.

How does the Home Equity Access Scheme work?

HEAS lets you draw a regular fortnightly payment, a lump sum, or a combination of both, secured against equity in Australian real estate you own. Services Australia assesses eligibility, sets the amount available, and administers the loan directly — there’s no private lender or broker in the transaction.

As at July 2026, a HEAS loan has no fixed term and no scheduled instalments. You can repay part or all of it at any time. If you sell the secured property, you can either transfer the loan to another property — including a new home — or repay it in full at settlement, so a sale doesn’t force repayment where the loan moves with you; you need to tell Services Australia no less than 14 days before the agreed settlement date that you want to settle.

If there’s an outstanding loan when you die, Services Australia will generally seek repayment from your estate after 14 weeks, and may defer that if your surviving partner is Age Pension age or older and living in the secured property — interest keeps accruing on the loan during any deferral. Services Australia’s guidance on repaying a HEAS loan doesn’t publish any other repayment trigger. What is confirmed, and covered below, is how the loan grows and how much of it you can access.

HEAS feature	As at July 2026
Interest rate	3.95% p.a., compounding fortnightly
Fortnightly payment cap	≤ 150% of maximum pension rate
Maximum loan amount	Age-based formula, not a flat %
Lump-sum advance cap	≤ 50% of max annual pension rate
Maximum lump-sum advances	2 per scheme rules
Security required	Australian real estate, adequately insured

Who is eligible for HEAS?

To get a HEAS loan, you or your partner must be of Age Pension age and qualify for an eligible pension — including at a zero rate, meaning you can qualify for a pension type even if the assets test or income test currently reduces your rate to nil. You also need to offer Australian real estate as security, carry adequate insurance over it, and not be bankrupt (Services Australia).

How much can you borrow under HEAS?

Two separate limits apply, and they work differently.

The fortnightly limit caps your combined Age Pension and HEAS payments, as at July 2026, at 150% of the maximum pension rate. That’s a running cap on what you receive each fortnight, not a total loan size.

The overall maximum loan amount is a different calculation — an age-based formula applied to the value of the property you offer as security, not a flat percentage of your pension:

Maximum loan amount = (security property value, rounded down to the nearest $10,000 ÷ $10,000) × age-based component amount (published by Services Australia)

The age-based component amount increases with age and sits in a table Services Australia publishes and updates directly, rather than as a single flat rate — so two owners offering the same property value can have different maximum loan amounts depending on their age.

Instead of, or alongside, fortnightly payments, you can ask for a lump-sum advance. As at July 2026, each advance is capped at 50% of the maximum annual pension rate per 26 fortnights, with a maximum of two advances (Services Australia).

What interest rate does HEAS charge?

As at July 2026, the HEAS interest rate is 3.95% per year, compounding fortnightly. Compounding means interest is calculated not just on what you’ve drawn, but on the interest already added to the loan — so the total owing grows faster the longer the loan runs and the more you draw against it.

This rate isn’t fixed for the life of the scheme. It’s set administratively and can change over time, so check the current rate on the Services Australia website before applying rather than relying on a figure quoted elsewhere, including this article.

How does HEAS affect my Age Pension?

HEAS is tied closely to the Age Pension system, but drawing a HEAS loan is a separate question from what happens to your Age Pension itself.

Eligibility for HEAS only requires that you qualify for an eligible pension type — including at a zero rate. That means someone whose Age Pension has been reduced to nil by the assets test or income test can still be eligible for HEAS, because eligibility depends on the pension type you qualify for, not the rate you’re currently paid.

Separately, any change to your assessable assets or income — including because of a HEAS loan or another equity-release option — can shift where you sit against the pension thresholds. As at July 2026, the assets test sets full-pension limits of $333,000 for a single homeowner and $600,000 for a single non-homeowner, and $499,000 combined for a homeowner couple and $766,000 for a non-homeowner couple; the part-pension cut-off sits at $733,500 (single homeowner), $1,000,500 (single non-homeowner), $1,102,500 (homeowner couple) and $1,369,500 (non-homeowner couple) (Services Australia). Your principal home, plus up to 2 hectares of surrounding land, stays exempt from the assets test regardless of any of this.

Payments can be affected in ways specific to your situation — contact Services Australia’s free Financial Information Service before proceeding.

Where does HEAS sit among other ways to access home equity?

HEAS is one of several ways older Australians can turn home equity into cash without selling the whole property. The others split into two groups: private loans, like reverse mortgages, and sales of a share of the property, like home reversion or a fractional sale.

Structurally, HEAS behaves like a private reverse mortgage — both are debts that compound interest over time rather than requiring you to sell a stake in the property. The difference is who runs it and how the amount is set. A private reverse mortgage is offered by a lender under its own commercial criteria; HEAS is a Commonwealth scheme administered by Services Australia, with the amount available tied to the pension system rather than a lender’s serviceability policy.

As at July 2026, HEAS carries its own no-negative-equity guarantee, in force since 1 July 2022 under social security law: when you or your estate settle the debt, you won’t have to repay more than the secured property’s market value, minus any other mortgages or legitimate claims against it. That guarantee can stop applying if you increase a mortgage or other encumbrance over the property, or misrepresent your circumstances or commit fraud — it isn’t unconditional. Private reverse mortgages carry a comparable but separate protection: contracts taken out from 18 September 2012 have statutory negative-equity protection under the National Consumer Credit Protection Act 2009 reforms, meaning you can’t end up owing the lender more than the home is worth (Moneysmart, the Federal Government website brought to you by ASIC) — also with its own conditions, not an unconditional promise either.

Home reversion and a fractional sale work differently again — both are sales, not loans, so there’s no interest charged and nothing to repay; the cost sits in the share of value you no longer own. Our guide to accessing home equity without a loan sets out how those non-debt options compare with each other and with debt options generally; a broader guide to the full range of alternatives to selling your home when you need money covers where each option, including HEAS, tends to fit.

None of these is inherently better than another. HEAS, a private reverse mortgage, home reversion, a fractional sale and simply downsizing each suit different circumstances — the right comparison depends on your age, the property’s value, how long you expect the arrangement to run, and what you want left for your estate.

How do you apply for HEAS?

Services Australia is the sole authoritative source for applying, checking current eligibility, and confirming today’s rates and caps — this article draws only from its published HEAS pages, not from any private lender, broker or comparison site. Start with the Home Equity Access Scheme page on servicesaustralia.gov.au, which links through to eligibility, rate and application detail directly. If you’re weighing HEAS against a private option, the current numbers for HEAS always come from Services Australia — its settings change independently of any private product you might be comparing it with.

Where can you get reliable information?

Services Australia publishes the full HEAS terms, including the current rate, the age-based loan-amount table, and application steps. Moneysmart — the Federal Government website brought to you by ASIC — covers how HEAS compares with private reverse mortgages and home reversion. General information can map how HEAS works and where it sits among the alternatives; it can’t tell you which option suits your circumstances. A licensed financial adviser, or Services Australia’s Financial Information Service, can help with that.