These early calls can lead to temporary repayment reductions, loan extensions, interest-only periods or other hardship arrangements. While these measures may prevent a borrower from entering formal arrears, they can also make the underlying level of financial stress harder to see in the headline data.
This raises an uncomfortable question for the RBA. If banks have not been consistently capturing and reporting every early request for assistance, policymakers may have been making interest-rate decisions without a complete picture of household mortgage pressure. Official arrears may remain relatively low, but the number of Australians quietly renegotiating their loans, cutting essential spending or relying on other debt could be considerably higher.
Mortgage arrears only identify borrowers who have already fallen behind on their scheduled repayments. They do not capture every household struggling to keep its mortgage under control.
This creates an important gap between mortgage stress and mortgage arrears. Recent surveys suggest that well over one million Australian borrowers are at risk of mortgage stress, while other consumer research indicates that close to two in five mortgage holders are experiencing some difficulty meeting repayments. More than 65,000 Australians also contacted the National Debt Helpline during the first five months of 2026, with mortgage pressure among the leading concerns.
That does not mean the RBA has no visibility over household stress. It receives extensive information from banks, regulators and household surveys. However, it does suggest that conventional arrears figures may be providing an incomplete picture of how deeply higher rates are affecting borrowers.
A household can remain technically current on its mortgage while cutting food spending, running down savings, increasing credit card debt or seeking assistance from its lender. None of these actions necessarily appears as a missed mortgage payment, yet collectively they can have a substantial effect on consumer spending and the broader economy.
This matters because the RBA is attempting to slow inflation without placing unnecessary pressure on households. If financial hardship is materially greater than the arrears figures indicate, each additional rate rise could have a sharper economic impact than expected. The consequences may first appear through weaker retail spending, declining consumer confidence and softer property prices, rather than an immediate surge in mortgage defaults.
While Australian households remain the focus locally, silver is once again attracting attention as it moves towards the psychologically important A$100 per ounce level.
Silver was trading around A$91 per ounce at the time of writing, leaving it approximately 10% short of A$100. That is certainly achievable for a metal that has already demonstrated considerable volatility this year, although reclaiming the level will require continued support from either the US-dollar silver price, a weaker Australian dollar, or a combination of both.
Silver benefits from two distinct sources of demand. Like gold, it is purchased as a physical store of value and an alternative to cash during periods of inflation, currency weakness and geopolitical uncertainty. Unlike gold, silver is also consumed extensively by industry, including solar manufacturing, electronics, electric vehicles and advanced electrical infrastructure.
That industrial exposure can amplify silver’s gains when investment demand and manufacturing demand rise together. It can also make silver more volatile than gold when markets become concerned about slowing economic activity.
The A$100 level is therefore more than a neat number. A sustained move above it could attract renewed investor attention and potentially establish a higher trading range. Silver has approached the mark before, so the key question is not simply whether it can touch A$100 again, but whether it can hold above it.
Mortgage stress is generally used to describe a household spending an uncomfortably large share of its income on mortgage repayments. A commonly quoted benchmark is 30% of household income, although this measure can be misleading because a high-income household may be able to spend more than 30% without experiencing genuine hardship.
Mortgage arrears are much more specific. A loan enters arrears when the borrower fails to make a scheduled repayment by its due date. Banks commonly report loans that are 30, 60 or 90 days behind, with 90-day arrears treated as a more serious indicator of repayment difficulty.
The difference is important. A borrower may be under severe financial pressure but remain completely up to date by using savings, credit cards or financial assistance from family. Another borrower may have entered a hardship arrangement with the bank that temporarily reduces the required repayment, allowing the loan to remain within its revised conditions.
Consequently, low arrears do not necessarily mean households are comfortable. They indicate that most borrowers are still meeting their formal obligations, sometimes after making substantial sacrifices elsewhere.
For the RBA, arrears remain an important measure of financial-system stability. However, hardship applications, depleted savings, consumer spending and household debt must also be considered when assessing the real effect of interest rates. The number of borrowers who have defaulted tells us how many households have already reached breaking point. Mortgage-stress data helps reveal how many may be approaching it.
