Sharp thinking

IF YOU’RE THINKING about refinancing, buying your next investment property or shopping for better insurance, you’re in the right place. Money’s Consumer Finance Awards are bursting at the seams with products and services to help ease many of your financial worries.

One in three Aussies says they are losing sleep at the prospect of more interest rate hikes, but you can get some peace of mind by comparing your existing home loan with our shortlist. Even something as simple as comparing the interest rates or the features can translate to savings of thousands of dollars over the life of your loan.

Small business owners also stand to benefit by comparing the fees, features and rates of our CFA winners in the credit card, business bank and money minder of the year categories.

We have four new categories covering the leading insurance and investment bond providers. It’s not just our banking needs that can affect our finances but how we protect our savings and build our retirement income.

We want to thank Plan For Life, actuaries & researchers (owned by ISS Market Intelligence) and its regional managing director, Rael Solomon, for providing us with the research and analysis behind these new categories.

We also want to thank our data provider, InfoChoice, and Alex Dunnin, Rainmaker Group’s executive director research and compliance, for compiling the analysis that underpinned this year’s winners and finalists. There are more than 3000 financial products spread across all the companies analysed for these awards.