Buying Property in AustraliaFrom Los Angeles
Home loan, refinancing and investment lending advice for Australians and expats buying from Los Angeles. We’re former bankers, we compare 40+ lenders, we’re paid by the lender (not by you), and we work Los Angeles hours.
- Australian citizens in the United States face no FIRB approval and no foreign-buyer ban: the whole Australian market is open to you, established homes included, and permanent residents are generally treated the same way while they remain ordinarily resident in Australia.
- US dollars sit on the preferred currency list, so lenders commonly count 80 per cent of your gross salary, and foreign overtime, allowances, commission and bonuses are now accepted in servicing at select lenders.
- Los Angeles runs seventeen hours behind Melbourne in the Australian winter and eighteen to nineteen in the summer: your evening lands in the Melbourne late morning or midday of the next day. We work to your time zone.
- The full journey, documents to settlement without a flight, is in our step-by-step overseas buying guide. This page covers what is specific to Los Angeles.
By the time you finish work in Los Angeles, Melbourne has started the next day. Take a call from a former banker, free.
Jot down your US dollar pay and which property or loan in Australia this is about.
Book a Los Angeles call with a former bankerHome loans for Australian expats in California
Start with the clock. Los Angeles runs seventeen hours behind Melbourne in the Australian winter, so 10am on a Tuesday in Melbourne is 5:00 PM the previous day in California. That gap is wider than most, and it hands you something useful: the back end of your working afternoon lines up with the front end of an Australian morning, so a call late in your day reaches people who are fresh rather than finishing. The country-level picture for every state, the treaty, FBAR and FATCA reporting and the sale-day tax rules is in our guide to home loans for Australian expats in the United States; this page stays with what is specific to Los Angeles.
Los Angeles anchors this guide because the state’s largest Australian community is there, but nothing on the page is peculiar to the city. What decides an Australian home loan is the property, the paperwork and the rules that apply back home, none of which know or care which Californian postcode you write from. Readers in San Francisco, San Diego and San Jose are covered by the same guide, word for word.
For the step that comes before finance, read our guide to buying property in Australia while living overseas.
How lenders read US dollars
An Australian lender reading a US-dollar payslip from LA will commonly bring about 80 per cent of gross salary into the assessment, USD being a fixture of the major preferred lists; whether overtime, allowances and bonuses join the count varies from lender to lender. Most lenders model the income at Australian tax scales regardless of what you actually pay stateside. Across the market, one payslip can support budgets six figures apart, so the matching decision carries real money.
Deposit and LVR on a US dollar salary. One major bank’s foreign income policy lists the US dollar in its top tier, so a salaried Los Angeles income is counted at 80 per cent of gross after a 20 per cent deduction, converted at the XE rate, and an Australian citizen living in California can borrow to 95 per cent of the property value with lenders mortgage insurance. Contract and production income is read lender by lender before any of that applies. A permanent resident living overseas stops at 80 per cent whatever the currency, and a file that settles at 80 per cent avoids LMI and widens the lender choice.
Los Angeles hosts the largest Australian community in the United States, spread across entertainment, music, production, tech and aerospace, and every one of those pay packets arrives in the currency at the top of each lender’s preferred list.
The currency is the easy half. USD’s preferred-list standing means lenders commonly count 80 per cent of your gross salary, and select lenders will take overtime, allowances, commission and bonuses earned abroad into servicing too, useful when part of the package rides on a production calendar. The half to plan for is shape: income that arrives per contract, per season or per credit is read differently at every credit desk, and most lenders will also model your salary at Australian tax scales even where your actual rate is lower. Each of those settings is its own reason the gap between lenders runs as wide as it does.
For a first pass on your own pay, the day’s USD rate lives at xe.com, which is what the lenders themselves check; drop it into the calculator below, which applies the income count set out in our Australian expat home loans guide and see what comes back. Read the result knowing one thing: hand the same LA payslip to the friendliest and the toughest lender in the market and the budgets they return are routinely six figures apart. Sorting the lender is the budget conversation itself, and it belongs before the house hunt.
LA’s Australian cohort is the most contract-shaped we deal with: production runs, studio deals, streaming gigs and startup equity sit alongside ordinary salaries, and lenders read each structure differently. The ones who handle variable and contract income well can build a strong file from exactly the pay history that makes other lenders nervous, which makes lender matching the whole game for the entertainment crowd. The dollars themselves could not be simpler: USD anchors every preferred list, and English documentation keeps the file clean.
It reruns every time you type. The 80 per cent tier and the cap of five on debt-to-income are indicative settings; where you actually land depends on tax modelling, commitments and full serviceability, and lender choice alone can move the result by six figures. Your inputs never leave the browser, are never saved and never reach us. General information only, not credit advice.
Cotality’s median dwelling values as at 30 September 2026, for context: Sydney $1,198,596, Brisbane $1,048,880, Perth $975,022, Adelaide $928,560, Melbourne $780,550. About $908,800 of indicative ceiling gets past the Melbourne median, while Sydney, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide would call for more deposit, a second income on the file or a different kind of property. All of it hangs off the worked example’s illustrative rate, though: the ceiling moves whenever the currency does, which is what the calculator above is quietly repricing as you type. Trust your own number from that calculator first, and use the full median tracker for the detail on every city.
Five years of the US dollar, in Australian dollars
Five years of Reserve Bank of Australia monthly data tell it plainly: about A$1.36 per US dollar in August 2021, A$1.54 in August 2023, A$1.53 in August 2025, about A$1.42 today. Had you converted a US$150,000 deposit at the five-year high you would hold $241,390 Australian; at the low, $198,781. Roughly $42,610 separates the two, and that difference is the whole argument for giving transfer timing the same attention as lender choice.
The current rate is always at xe.com, and one paste into the calculator above shows what it does to your borrowing power. Currency prediction is a losing script, so write a safer one: learn ahead of time what a few cents of movement means for your deposit, move big sums across in instalments rather than on one chosen morning, and keep the settlement-transfer safeguards wrapped around every transfer. Exchange-rate figures are RBA monthly averages, general information only, not financial or FX advice.
Get your US dollar income assessed before you commit.
A former banker checks how each lender treats USD income and prices your Australian purchase or refinance across 40+ lenders, free, at a time that suits your time zone.
Book a free expat chat with a former bankerIn Los Angeles? WhatsApp Ahmed from where you are. It is his own mobile, no call centre, and the first chat is free.
Los Angeles logistics, solved
Practicalities for Los Angeles-based buyers: the time difference of seventeen to nineteen hours behind Melbourne shapes call scheduling rather than preventing it; documents follow the standard expat file of employment evidence, bank statements and recent payslips; documents are typically in English, simplifying the file; and inspections, contracts and settlement all complete remotely.
- Time zones: Los Angeles is seventeen to nineteen hours behind Melbourne. Your evening lands in Melbourne’s late morning the next day, and our calendar shows slots in your local time.
- Documents: the standard expat file applies: employment contract or letter, three months of salary credits, two payslips no older than about 60 days. Payslips and contracts are typically issued in English, which keeps the document file straightforward.
- On the ground: San Diego, Silicon Beach and the whole west coast run the same USD playbook. Inspections, exchange and settlement all run remotely: the mechanics are Steps 5 and 6 of the main guide.
- Tax at the California end: California treats you as a resident if you are present in the state for other than a temporary or transitory purpose, and the Franchise Tax Board residency rules tax residents on income from all sources, so before Australian rent starts arriving while you live in Los Angeles, speak to a California tax adviser.
- The US tax treaty: The United States and Australia have an income tax treaty, listed on the IRS treaty pages, which exists to reduce double taxation on certain income, though how it applies to a Los Angeles-based owner of Australian property depends on individual circumstances.
- Official paperwork nearby: Australia maintains a consulate in Los Angeles, one of seven Australian missions in the United States listed on the Australian Embassy and Consulates page, and its notarial services are worth knowing about when settlement paperwork needs witnessed signatures or certified copies.
- The market you are buying into: premium values fell 3.2 per cent in the three months to July 2026 while clearance rates sat under 50 per cent: the case for this cycle is in our buyer’s market analysis and buy-back window piece.
In Los Angeles? Start with one email. Email ahmed@everstonefinance.com.au, the link pre-fills a short template, and we reply within a day, your time. Or book a slot.
Australians elsewhere: our guides for New York, United States, Toronto, Canada, or the full overseas playbook.
Already own in Australia? Refinance, cash out and equity release, from Los Angeles
Australians in Los Angeles who already own in Australia can refinance and release equity remotely, at select lenders, on the same shaded US dollar assessment as a purchase. The LA twist is the income doing the servicing: production runs, studio deals, streaming gigs and loan-out structures are read very differently from one credit team to the next, so the lender holding your loan today is not automatically the one that reads your income best now. According to Everstone Finance, Australians in Los Angeles can refinance an Australian mortgage without leaving the United States: identity is certified locally, documents are signed electronically, and settlement runs through PEXA, the electronic settlement platform for Australian property.
Contract income ages differently from a salary. A loan set up in one production cycle can drift onto a stale rate while the one to two years of consistent credits lenders actually assess would now qualify you somewhere sharper. Both fixes run remotely. On the rate, work the playbook in our negotiate-your-rate guide, reprice first, then switch if your lender will not move, and check the cashback offers currently on the market, which reward qualifying switchers. On the deposit, select lenders will release part of the growth in an Australian property to fund the next one, provided the variable income history supports both loans inside LVR caps. For the entertainment crowd the refinance file is built from exactly the pay history that makes some lenders nervous, statements, agreements and consistent credits, so matching the income shape to the credit team that reads it best comes before any application is lodged.
The home equity loan an American neighbour would take becomes, on Australian property, a cash out refinance from Los Angeles, usually run as a loan increase, an equity release refinance or a separate split rather than the home equity line of credit or second mortgage common in America, as our expat cash out refinance explainer shows. Most lenders stop near 80 per cent of current value without mortgage insurance, less the balance owing, and the valuation is done in Australia; the calls are booked in your own time zone.
California and the West Coast, San Diego to Seattle: one Australian loan file for the whole coast
An Australian citizen anywhere on the West Coast of the United States, in San Francisco, the Bay Area, Silicon Valley, San Diego, Portland or Seattle, is assessed for an Australian purchase or refinance on the file set out above for Los Angeles: United States dollar income on the preferred tier at around 80 per cent of gross, the same contract, credits and payslips, and the same lender-by-lender reading of equity and contract pay. The coast alters the composition of the pay packet, not the rulebook. A Bay Area or Seattle package usually carries the RSU question, a San Diego or Portland salary is often the plainer file, and an Oregon or Washington State address makes no difference to a credit desk in Australia. For the rest of the country, the Northeast, the Midwest, Texas and the Southeast, read the guide for Australians in New York and the United States.
Two Australian consulates-general divide the coast between them. Los Angeles, at 2029 Century Park East, serves Southern California; San Francisco, at 575 Market Street, serves Northern California, Oregon and Washington State, which places Bay Area, Silicon Valley, Portland and Seattle files at the San Francisco office. At either post, witnessing a signature and certifying identity documents are in-person acts by appointment, charged at AUD 90 per act under the Consular Fees Act schedule current from 1 September 2026 and payable by card. The embassy’s notarial FAQ allows that some documents can be witnessed by a local notary or a similarly authorised person, and acceptance of a notary public or of digital verification differs from lender to lender, as our overseas refinancing guide sets out, so check the route your lender allows before you book a slot in either city.
The whole coast keeps one clock. California, Oregon and Washington State are all on Pacific time, eight hours behind UTC in winter and seven under daylight saving, which the United States observes between 8 March and 1 November in 2026, the second Sunday of March to the first of November. Against Melbourne, which puts its own clocks forward on 4 October 2026, the gap is seventeen hours now, eighteen from October and nineteen from November until the American clocks go forward again in March. A 5pm finish in Seattle, Portland or San Jose therefore lands at 10am, 11am or midday the next day in Melbourne depending on the month, and the appointment calendar shows both clocks so nobody has to do the arithmetic.
From San Diego to Seattle the currency is the United States dollar. For the record, the Reserve Bank of Australia’s 4 September 2026 daily rate was 0.7210 United States dollars to one Australian dollar, and the five-year monthly series above is the better read on timing. In short: California and the West Coast are one file, the United States dollar on the preferred tier, the lender reading the RSUs and contract pay; San Francisco certifies the northern half of the coast, Los Angeles the south, and Pacific time keeps every West Coast appointment seventeen to nineteen hours behind Melbourne.
Can an Australian in Los Angeles borrow in Australia on contract income?
Yes. US dollars sit on the major preferred lists, so an Australian lender commonly counts about 80 per cent of gross salary from Los Angeles. What varies is the shape of the income: production runs, studio deals, streaming gigs and loan-out structures are read differently from one credit team to the next, so lender matching decides the budget.
The lender rules behind this guide are collected on our Australian expat home loans page, and the way we work with clients in Los Angeles is on our Australian expat mortgage broker page.
Buying a home in Australia from Los Angeles: the income shape, then the West Coast clock
Buying a home in Australia from Los Angeles is decided by the shape of the income before anything else: a salary in US dollars counts at around 80 per cent of gross on every preferred list, while production runs, studio deals and loan out structures are read differently by every credit team, so the lender is chosen for the income you actually have. Identity is certified at the Consulate-General at 2029 Century Park East, or in San Francisco for the north of the state, by appointment. Seventeen to nineteen hours behind Melbourne, the file runs as an overnight handover through an Australian conveyancer, electronic signing and PEXA settlement.
Whether you search buying a home in Australia from Los Angeles, buying a house in Australia from California, buying property in Australia from the USA or can I buy a house in Australia from LA, an Australian citizen or permanent resident can from anywhere on the West Coast, San Diego to Seattle, and the entertainment income question is answered in the FAQ below.
Self-employed in Los Angeles: building the file from your own work
If you contract in Los Angeles, which a great deal of work there is structured around, or run your own company, the US dollars come from engagements rather than a payroll. That is a difference in documentation, not in substance.
The expat lending template is an employee file: a payslip, an employment contract, matching salary credits. A self-employed file is assembled from different parts, and how the income is evidenced decides it rather than its size.
Everstone Finance works out the documentation route before lodging anything. Brighten writes non-resident lending as either a full documentation loan or an alternative documentation loan. Bluestone treats any Australian citizen or permanent resident living overseas and earning in a foreign currency as an expat, and publishes flexible income verification options that include self-employed borrowers. Everstone matches those to how you are paid, because a decline leaves a credit enquiry and a valuation on the record.
Start there. The west coast evening is the one window that reaches an Australian working morning, and the first call is the right moment to settle the lender question rather than discover it later.
Frequently asked questions
Can an Australian living in Los Angeles buy property in Australia?
Yes, plainly. FIRB approval is a foreign-person requirement, and citizens of Australia are not foreign persons however long they have been in California, so nothing needs approving and established homes remain available. Permanent residents are generally treated the same way while they remain ordinarily resident in Australia, though a PR holder who has lived overseas for an extended period can be treated as a foreign person under FIRB rules and should confirm their position before signing a contract. The work that remains, lending and logistics, all runs from Los Angeles.
How do Australian expats in California apply for a home loan back home?
The application itself is Australian, so it starts with the same building blocks: income evidence, a record of your commitments, identification, and a clear view of the property or the loan you want to refinance. Living in Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego or San Jose changes the logistics rather than the substance. Documents move electronically, most steps are handled remotely, and the calendar shows call times in your own time zone.
How much of a USD salary will an Australian lender count?
Commonly around 80 per cent of gross salary, since US dollars sit on the preferred currency lists, with overtime, allowances and bonuses now accepted at select lenders. For Los Angeles contract and production earners the assessment leans on one to two years of consistent credits, and policies still differ enough between lenders to move the budget by six figures.
Do I need to fly back to Australia to buy?
No. Inspections run by video and local eyes, contracts sign electronically in most cases, and settlement completes electronically between your conveyancer and lender. From Los Angeles the west coast time difference is absorbed by an email-first process, and the step-by-step mechanics are in our main overseas buying guide.
What documents do I need from Los Angeles?
An employment contract or employer letter, three months of bank statements showing salary credits, and two recent payslips no older than about 60 days, with extra evidence for bonus or allowance income. Los Angeles payslips and contracts are typically issued in English, which keeps the document file straightforward, and where pay flows through a loan-out company or LLC, lenders want one to two years of consistent income through the structure, evidenced cleanly.
I work in entertainment on contract and production income. Can that count?
Yes, with the right lender: contract, production and variable income is assessed on history, typically one to two years of consistent credits evidenced through statements and agreements, and some lenders average it generously while others discount it heavily. Equity compensation such as RSUs is treated separately again. Matching the income shape to the lender that reads it best is the core of the exercise.
Is Los Angeles different from New York for this process?
The lending treatment is identical, since assessment follows the currency rather than the city: US dollars on the preferred 80 per cent tier. What differs is practical: the time difference to Melbourne is three hours larger from the west coast, which our email-first process absorbs.
When should I convert my USD savings into Australian dollars?
Plainly: no one picks the day. The five-year spread above put roughly $42,610 Australian between converting a US$150,000 deposit at the high and at the low, and staging transfers is how you stop one date from carrying that much weight. Because lenders want deposit funds traceable and seasoned, the movement plan is early-process work, not a settlement-week scramble.
Production work pays me through an LLC or loan-out company. Does that complicate things?
It moves you toward self-employed assessment at some lenders and stays simple at others that read the underlying contracts: one to two years of consistent income through the structure, evidenced cleanly, keeps most doors open. The loan-out setup is common enough in LA that the right lender treats it as routine.
I already own a property in Australia. Can I refinance or release equity from Los Angeles?
Yes, at select lenders: refinancing and equity release run remotely from Los Angeles on the same shaded USD basis as a purchase, and for contract and production earners the file leans on one to two years of consistent credits, evidenced through statements and agreements. Released equity can become the next deposit, provided serviceability holds across both loans at current valuations and inside LVR caps, so map the structure with a broker before you commit.
Can I refinance my Australian investment property from Los Angeles if it is rented out?
Yes, in most cases. The rent from the Australian property is assessed alongside your USD salary, and an investment loan that has sat untouched for years is often the first candidate for review. Everything runs remotely on the assessment described on this page, and a property you already own needs no FIRB approval to refinance.
Can an Australian living anywhere in California or on the West Coast get an Australian home loan?
Yes. Australian citizens in San Francisco, the Bay Area, Silicon Valley, San Diego, Portland or Seattle borrow and refinance in Australia on the same basis as one in Los Angeles: United States dollar income read on the preferred tier, documents assembled remotely, identity certified at the Los Angeles or San Francisco consulate-general, and settlement completed electronically in Australia. No FIRB approval applies to citizens.
Does it matter whether I live in Los Angeles, San Francisco or Seattle?
Not to the lender. The currency, the shading and the documents are identical along the coast, and the whole West Coast shares Pacific time, so the hours behind Melbourne are the same from San Diego to Seattle. The one practical split is consular: Southern California files are certified in Los Angeles, while Northern California, Oregon and Washington State use San Francisco.
How do I buy a home in Australia from Los Angeles, step by step?
Match the lender to the income first: salaried US dollar pay on the preferred tier, or contract and production income read by the credit team that accepts it. Get a pre-approval on that basis. Book certification at the Consulate-General at 2029 Century Park East, or San Francisco for Northern California, in the pre-approval week. Search with a buyers agent or family in Australia, have an Australian conveyancer review the contract, sign electronically, transfer the deposit from the US account with its statements, and settle through PEXA. Send documents at the end of your day; they are actioned during the Australian working day that follows.
Los Angeles to Melbourne is one conversation. Start it today, your time.
Your USD salary through the right lender’s eyes, your real budget in both currencies, and the whole purchase run remotely by former bankers. No cost, no obligation.
Book a chat with a former bankerAustralians buy back home from everywhere, and each city runs by its own clock and currency. See how the same purchase works from New York, United States, Toronto, Canada, Santiago, Chile and Auckland, New Zealand, or start with the buying property in Australia from overseas guide, which maps all twenty guides.
The people behind Everstone
You’re trusting someone with one of the biggest financial decisions you’ll make. Here’s who you’ll actually be working with.
Ahmed Lotfi
A former major-bank lender who now works entirely for you. Ahmed handles structuring, refinancing and investment lending across the 40+ lender panel.
Zappelin Heng
Co-founder with deep lender experience, focused on getting complex and self-employed files assessed on their real strength, not a tick-box.
About the author. Ahmed Lotfi is co-founder of Everstone Finance and a former banker who now works as a mortgage and finance broker in South Yarra, Melbourne, arranging home, investment and commercial lending for Australians at home and abroad. Everstone Finance operates under the Best Interests Duty as Credit Representative 574314 of LMG Broker Services Pty Ltd, Australian Credit Licence 517921.