Sky News Australia can exclusively reveal Dr Philip Lowe obtained a half-price home loan - subsidised by taxpayers - from the Reserve Bank to purchase his five-bedroom property in Sydney's east in 1997.
For about 20 years, his interest rate was locked at half the standard variable rate being paid by Commonwealth Bank customers across Australia.The revelation comes as 880,000 Australians brace for their fixed rate mortgages to end this year and a tenth-straight interest rate increase, announced on Tuesday, with the official cash rate now at 3.6 per cent.
The documents suggest that neither of the loans have been discharged but a spokeswoman for the RBA insists they were paid off “several years ago” and Dr Lowe no longer has a mortgage. The existence of the Officers' Home Advances Scheme courted controversy 20 years ago when it was revealed almost a quarter of RBA staff in 2003 were benefitting from the mortgages heavily subsidised by taxpayers.
He was already under fire for his forecast that interest rates were unlikely to rise until at least 2024.Treasurer Jim Chalmers is yet to decide whether he will reappoint the governor when his seven-year-term expires on September 17He told Sunday Agenda last month he would decide closer to the middle of the year.
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