🔍 Your credit score changed in March. Here’s what happened.

If you haven’t checked your credit score since February, do it this week. Not because something’s wrong. Because in March 2026, it changed, and you may not even realise it.

Experian, one of Australia’s three credit bureaus, completed its acquisition of illion. The two had been operating separately, meaning your credit file with each could look quite different. From March, those files were recalculated using the combined dataset. From 1 April 2026, when a lender pulls your credit report, they see a merged version.

Some scores went up. Some went down. Whether yours improved or dropped depends on what each bureau was holding and how the new model weighted it.

Here’s what that means for you: if you were knocked back on a car loan in late 2025, your score may now look better. If you were cruising through applications with confidence, that confidence might be based on a score that no longer exists.

The mechanics of disputing an error take weeks. A car loan assessment takes minutes. Check your report now, at a time of your choosing, not the week you’re trying to buy a car.

Free reports are available from both Experian and Equifax. Look for unfamiliar enquiries, accounts you don’t recognise, or any defaults you weren’t notified about. Anything that looks wrong can be disputed, but you need to catch it first. Full breakdown via Finder

💡 Balloon payments: the lump sum hiding at the end of your loan

A balloon payment is a portion of your loan principal you don’t repay during the regular term. You defer it to the end, which makes monthly repayments smaller. It also creates a large single bill when the loan finishes.

The appeal is obvious. Lower repayments make more expensive cars feel manageable. The risk is what happens when the term ends.

Your three options at that point: pay the lump sum if you’ve saved for it, refinance it into a new loan, or sell the car to cover it. The problem with option three is depreciation. If the balloon is larger than what the car is worth by year five, you’re covering that gap yourself.

Over a five-year loan, a balloon structure costs around $1,832 more in total interest than a standard loan. That’s the cost of the lower repayments up front.

Real story: we see buyers focus entirely on the monthly number and miss the balloon sitting at the end. A few years later, the options aren’t as clean as they looked at signing. Full guide on the Gusto Finance blog

📈 RBA raises the cash rate to 4.35%

The Reserve Bank lifted the cash rate by 0.25% this week to 4.35%. That’s the third consecutive hike in 2026, and the highest the rate has been in 15 years.

The reason: inflation hasn’t eased as quickly as expected, with fuel costs from Middle East conflict pressures still working through the system. Lenders typically pass increases to variable-rate customers within 24 to 48 hours.

The average variable car loan rate now sits around 8.92% p.a. If your loan is variable, your next repayment will be higher. If you’re fixed, you’re sheltered for now, but worth confirming that before assuming.

For anyone considering a new loan, the same hike tightens the serviceability buffer lenders apply. Your borrowing capacity is a little smaller than it was last month. RBA announcement

More from the Gusto Group

Gusto Finance is part of a broader family of businesses built to help everyday Australians across every stage of the buying journey.

🏠 Gusto Home Loans: We do for home loans what we do for car finance. Whether you’re buying, refinancing, or just want to know your borrowing power, our team compares options across a massive lender panel.

🚗 Gusto Auto: Our Brisbane-based used car dealership. If you want a seamless experience, you can buy a quality used vehicle directly from us while Gusto Finance handles the loan.

💸 Gusto Cash: Need access to funds fast? We provide flexible personal cash loans for when life happens outside of a standard car or home loan.

The Gusto Finance Team