You Don't Need a 20% Deposit to Buy Your First Home - Here's What You Actually Need
- Apr 13
- 5 min read
I want to tell you about a conversation I had recently with a woman who is trying to buy her first home.
She shared how she feels buried by bills, like she's drowning in debt (that she feels embarrassed by) and feels like no matter how hard she tried to save, life kept getting in the way. One step forward, three steps back. And the question she kept asking herself was "how is everyone else doing this?"
And if you're reading this right now and you're nodding along, feeling the same, this blog post is for you.
I've Been Exactly Where You Are
Before I bought my first home, my money situation was messy.
I had a $5,000 credit card debt I'd racked up as an 18-year-old who thought having one made me 'a grown-up' (Spoiler: it did not.) I had a $5,000 HECS debt from a university degree I'd ditched because it wasn't the right fit. And my now-husband? He had a $7,000 maxed-out credit card, a $27,000 car loan on a black sports car - which was costing him just under $1,000 a month in repayments, not counting fuel, rego or tyres - and his own HECS debt of around $26,000.
So between us, before we bought our first place, we had just over $70,000 in debt.
I remember standing in my parents' garage at 20 years old, staring at a whiteboard we'd covered in numbers - our debts, incomes, expenses, and our repayments - and I remember thinking: how did we get here? I'm not an idiot. Why can't I figure this out?
Homeownership felt impossibly far away. Like something I could see through a window but couldn't touch.
That Moment Everything Changed
There was a moment standing at that whiteboard, when I got sick and tired of feeling disempowered. I was sick of obsessing over money, worrying about it constantly, but doing nothing about it. And thinking about what was coming... my husband was wanting to go back to university in a couple of years, which would mean going from two incomes to one. If we didn't get serious now, I knew we'd be renting for another four or five years while he studied, and then starting the home buying process from scratch on the other side of that.
That's when I decided it was time to get serious. I realised that no one else is coming to save me, and avoiding the numbers won't change them.
So instead of pointing fingers, blaming circumstances, or justifying how we'd gotten into this position - we accepted it. I figured, I got myself here. I can get myself out. And we started asking different questions.
Instead of asking "why is this so hard?" we started asking questions like "how can we make this work?"
How can we clear these credit cards?
How can we get rid of that car loan?
Who do we need in our corner?
What education do we need?
Who do we need to be?
What do we need to do next?
12 Months of Doing the Invisible Work
We spent the next 12 months getting intentional about our money (and what we were doing with it).
We said no to overseas holidays, and that was hard. I'd been going overseas every year since I was 17, and it was something I was really proud of.
We said no to a lot of social catchups, buying gifts, lunches out. We looked at every dollar coming in and asked it the same question: where is this money going? And is that where I want it to go?
We cleared the credit cards. We cut them up into confetti and had a little dance party (not joking - it was fun and liberating!).
We sold the sports car. I still remember it driving off the driveway and my hubby having a tear in his eye - he loved that car. It was bittersweet. But no longer needing to make a $1,000 a month repayment meant that we could finally set up an automated regular savings habit.
Our borrowing capacity increased because our debts were gone and our income was freed up. And 12 months later, we were in a completely different position.
I was 21 when we bought our first property. Not with a 20% deposit - with a 5% deposit. And our first place wasn't pretty. It was a circa-1970s low-set brick home with khaki green carpet, kookaburra stickers on the kitchen wall, and not a single working light. I remember sitting on the floor with takeaway noodles and cheap red wine and thinking: this is how it starts.
What No One Shows You on Social Media
Here's the thing about all those beautiful renovation reveals, the "we just bought our first home" posts, the before-and-afters on TV. We see the results, but rarely do we see the runway.
We don't often see the 12 months of saying no. The whiteboard in the garage, the sports car driving away, the credit card confetti, the automated savings transfer set up on a Tuesday morning because they've finally freed up enough cash flow to make it possible.
We see the highlights and compare our behind-the-scenes to it. And that comparison makes us feel defeated before we've even started.
So I want you to know that the invisible work is real. The runway is real. And it's what makes everything else possible.
What You Actually Need to Buy Your First Home
There is so much noise and misinformation out there. Let's clear some of it up...
You do not need a 20% deposit to buy your first place. You can get into the market with as little as 5% (2% even in some cases), depending on your situation and pathway.
You can still buy your first home even if you have debt. It may take a little longer to get there, you may need to clear some debt first (credit card confetti dance parties are awesome!) - and that's completely okay. It's possible.
Your journey will not look like anyone else's - and it shouldn't. Everyone's financial situation is different, and the good news is that there is more than one pathway in.
So clearing a couple of those up - what do you actually need?
The things that actually make the difference may surprise you, because it's got nothing to do with savings or incomes or the market. It all starts with your why, your education, a plan, and a team.
Why do you want to buy property? What's your intention - your long-term vision for your life, and how will owning property help create that?
From there it's about getting the right education and information (not the noise and misinformation that's everywhere), a plan tailored to your unique situation, and the right team in your corner - people who have done this before and can guide you.
Start Building Your Runway
When I finished telling that story, the woman I was talking to let out a long slow breath - like she'd been holding it for months. Something had shifted.
Not because her situation had changed. But because she could finally see it differently.
She wasn't behind. She was just at the beginning of building her runway.
And if you're somewhere in the middle of yours right now - knee-deep in debt, watching your savings disappear, wondering when it's going to click - that's exactly where a lot of people are before things start to shift. The work you're doing right now, even when it feels invisible, even when it feels slow, is the work that makes the difference.
Get clear on your why. Get the right people around you. Ask better questions.
And trust that the runway you're building right now is what's going to have you lift off. I mean, if I can do it, you can do it too 🥰
And I’ll be right over here cheering you on.
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