Bond pre-qualification and pre-approval in South Africa

Banks and bond originators use the two words loosely, and the law does not settle which is which. The National Credit Act, which we read as first gazetted in 2006, does not use the word pre-qualification. It uses "pre-approval statement" once, in section 92(7), and in the text we read it does not define the term. So the label tells you little. What matters is what the lender did: whether it looked at your credit record, whether it checked your documents, what it gave back, and for how long.

The table sets out what three lenders say on their own pages, which we read on 20 October 2026. These are the lenders' descriptions of their own process, not law, and they can change.

ooba, another bond originator, uses the word prequalification on its pre-approval page. Its page says your credit score is checked even in its online tool. For its in-depth option it asks for a signed form, ID, a payslip and a bank statement, and it calls the resulting certificate a Qualified Buyer's Certificate, which is ooba's own name for it. Its page states no validity period. So at ooba a word that sounds light covers a credit-checked process, and at SA Home Loans a word that sounds heavy describes an estimate.

As a rule of thumb, pre-qualification is the lighter step and pre-approval the heavier one. That is only a starting point, because the lenders above do not all follow it. A certificate is better judged by what was done than by the title at the top. The four questions further down set that out.

No. Neither a pre-qualification nor a pre-approval is a bond. SA Home Loans says formal approval comes only after you find a property and sign an offer to purchase, and that it then does a final credit check and has the specific property valued. BetterBond says pre-approval does not mean the bank has approved your bond application. ooba's page says its version is not a guarantee of a home loan.

The Act points the same way. Section 92 requires a statement and quotation before a credit agreement is entered into. Section 92(7) says that section does not apply to an offer, proposal, "pre-approval statement" or similar arrangement in which a credit provider merely indicates a willingness to consider an application for a hypothetical future credit agreement, generally or up to a specified maximum value. In our reading, that makes a pre-approval statement an indication of willingness, not the agreement.

Section 81(2) separately says a credit provider must not enter into a credit agreement without first taking reasonable steps to assess you. For a home loan, entering the agreement is the real bond, so in our reading an earlier certificate does not replace that assessment.

Things that can move between the certificate and the bond:

• The valuation. SA Home Loans says it has the specific property valued after the signed offer. In our reading, a value below the price can mean a smaller loan against that property than the certificate suggested. We found no lender page saying how it treats a low valuation. How to price your house shows how registered sale prices test a price.
• The final credit check. SA Home Loans names it as a step after the signed offer. In our reading it looks at your record as it stands then, so a change in between can matter.
• Your income and debts. Section 81(2) has the lender assess your existing financial means, prospects and obligations before it enters the agreement. A certificate rests on the position on its date. The bond application is assessed on the position then.
• Interest rates. BetterBond says its certificate shows possible repayments at various interest rates and deposits, and rates move. See the prime rate.
• Answers that do not match your documents. Section 81(1) requires a consumer to answer the lender's questions fully and truthfully. The section on your side of the assessment has the detail.

A certificate is not the same as the bank approving the bond. What protects a buyer if the bond is refused is the clause in the offer that makes it subject to bond approval, and a certificate does not fulfil that clause. What "subject to bond approval" means explains the clause and its dates.

The National Credit Act as gazetted uses the term pre-approval statement only in section 92(7), and sets no validity period for one. We found none in the March 2015 Regulations either, and we have not checked later amendments. So the period, if there is one, is the lender's own. This is what the pages we read say, on 20 October 2026:

• BetterBond: the certificate is valid for 90 days, in the text of its page. A heading on the same page says three months, and the page says the information it keeps can be used if you sign an offer to purchase within three months of getting pre-approval.
• SA Home Loans: its pre-approval page states no period.
• Absa: its pre-qualification page states no period.
• ooba: its pre-approval page states no period.

Of the four lenders, only BetterBond states a period, so a certificate from another lender should not be assumed to last 90 days. The pages we read do not say what happens when a lender's period runs out before an offer is signed. Income, debts and credit record may have moved on by then anyway.

A certificate with no date or expiry cannot be judged for age. The lender can be asked for one in writing. A certificate that is still in date can still be overtaken by the bank's own final checks, as above.

A home loan is a credit agreement under the National Credit Act. This guide reads sections 4, 9, 62, 72, 80, 81 and 92 as first gazetted in March 2006 (Government Gazette 28619). The National Credit Amendment Act 19 of 2014 substituted section 82 and, on our reading of its list of amended sections, none of the others quoted here. We have not checked any later amendment.

Check the current text of any section on this page with the National Credit Regulator or an attorney who practises consumer credit law before relying on it. We say this once here, and it applies to every section number in this guide.

What the Act asks of the lender. Section 81(2) says a credit provider must not enter into a credit agreement without first taking reasonable steps to assess three things about you. Section 81(3) says it must not enter into a reckless credit agreement. Section 80 says an agreement is reckless if the lender did not do the assessment, or did it and went ahead although the information indicated that you did not understand the risks, costs or obligations, or that the loan would make you over-indebted.

• Understanding. Whether you have a general understanding and appreciation of the risks and costs of the loan, and of your rights and obligations under it.
• Repayment history. Your debt re-payment history as a consumer under credit agreements. This is where your credit record comes in.
• Means, prospects and obligations. What you earn now, what you are likely to earn, and what you already owe each month.

Your duty. Section 81(1) requires a prospective consumer to answer the lender's requests for information fully and truthfully. Section 81(4) says it is a complete defence for a lender, against an allegation that a loan is reckless, if it shows that the consumer did not and a court or the Tribunal finds that this materially affected its ability to assess properly. That is why an overstated income or an omitted debt matters.

The method is the lender's, within the Regulations. Section 82(1), as substituted by section 24 of the National Credit Amendment Act 19 of 2014, lets a credit provider determine for itself the mechanisms, models and procedures it uses for its section 81 assessment. The result must be fair and objective, and the method must not be inconsistent with the affordability assessment regulations the Minister makes. Section 82(2), as substituted, says the Minister must make those regulations on the National Credit Regulator's recommendation. The amendment came into operation on 13 March 2015, the date of the proclamation in Government Gazette 38557, and that Gazette also published the National Credit Regulations including Affordability Assessment Regulations (GN R202).

Within the Regulations, then, each lender builds its own models and procedures, which is one reason the lender pages we read ask for different things. It is also why this guide gives no payment-to-income percentage: the Act sets none, and we have not read one on a lender's own page. We have not confirmed whether parts of the 2015 Regulations have since been amended or set aside, so we do not treat their detail, including any document list, as the current rule.

Your right to reasons. Section 62(1) says that on request a credit provider must tell you in writing the dominant reason for refusing to enter into a credit agreement with you. Section 62(2) adds that if it based the decision on an adverse credit report, it must give you the name and contact details of the bureau. Under section 92(7), a pre-approval statement is a lender's indication of willingness to consider an application, not a credit agreement. So whether section 62 reaches a refused pre-approval is not clear from the text we read. The lender can be asked for the reason either way.

Whose loan. Whether the Act covers a bond depends on who borrows. Section 4(1) excludes an agreement where the consumer is a juristic person at or above an asset value or turnover the Minister sets, and a large agreement where the juristic person is below it. Section 9(4)(a) makes a mortgage agreement a large agreement. On our reading, a home loan to a juristic person therefore falls outside the Act whatever its size. We have not read the Minister's figure. The Act's definition of juristic person includes a company and a trust that has three or more individual trustees or a trustee that is itself a juristic person. A trust with one or two individual trustees and no corporate trustee does not meet that definition. This is a legal reading, so confirm it as described above. Owning property in your own name, a company or a trust explains the structures.

No document list for a pre-approval comes from a source we have confirmed as law. Section 82 leaves the method to the lender, and we do not rely on the Regulations' document list (see above). The table below is only what four lender pages name, read on 20 October 2026. It is lender practice, not a legal list, and it is not complete.

BetterBond's page says you submit the same documents as for a bond application and names none. Lenders may ask for more, such as proof of address or, for the self-employed, financial statements. None of the four pages names these, so they are not confirmed by a source we read. SA Home Loans' form asks whether you are self-employed, but its page lists no extra documents for that case.

A certificate can be judged by what it rests on. These four questions suit a buyer checking a lender's certificate and a seller reading a buyer's. Each one is about what the certificate rests on.

• 1. Was a credit report pulled? If so, was it a soft or a hard enquiry? SA Home Loans says a soft inquiry does not affect your score and a hard one may. Lenders differ, and Absa's page does not mention a credit check at all.
• 2. Were the documents checked? Or is the certificate based on figures typed into a form? An estimate from typed figures is a different thing from one built on verified payslips and statements.
• 3. Which bank or banks is it for? BetterBond says its pre-approval indicates what the big banks are willing to offer. A bank's own certificate speaks for that bank only.
• 4. When does it stop being good? Is the date written on it? As above, only BetterBond of the four lenders states a period.
• A certificate that cannot answer these is an estimate, whatever it is called.

There are three routes into a pre-approval. They are not mutually exclusive.

• Your own bank. You see one lender's view of your file, and its certificate speaks for that lender only.
• A bond originator, such as BetterBond or ooba. BetterBond's page says its pre-approval indicates what the big banks will be willing to offer, so one application gives a view of several lenders. That is BetterBond's claim, and we have not tested it. The Act as gazetted does not mention bond originators, and we found no rule in it on what one may charge. Whether it costs you anything, and how the originator is paid, are questions for the originator in writing. BetterBond describes its online pre-approval as free.
• Several banks yourself. Each lender decides separately. SA Home Loans says its pre-approval is generally a soft inquiry and a full application a hard one, so the type of enquiry is worth asking each lender about. We found no South African bureau or NCR source saying that a run of applications close together counts as one, so that should not be assumed.

Privately is not a lender and does not issue, check or vouch for certificates. To compare originators and start an application, see the bond originators listed on Privately. You can also tell us what you are looking for, and the bond and affordability calculators give a rough figure before you speak to a lender.

When buyer and seller deal directly, no agent screens the buyer, so the seller reads the buyer's evidence first-hand. Absa, SA Home Loans and BetterBond each say on their own pages that their product shows sellers you are a serious buyer, and BetterBond adds that its certificate indicates the highest price you can afford. That makes a certificate evidence of a first step with a lender, not of a bond. A seller reading one can put the four questions to it.

Buying privately explains where a certificate fits in a buyer's steps. Absa and SA Home Loans describe pre-qualification and pre-approval as a way to know what you can afford before house hunting.

Selling privately covers offers from the seller's side. A seller reading a certificate can ask the four questions and look at the offer's bond clause to see what happens if the bond is refused.

A decline reflects one lender's assessment of your file on that day. This is what the sources we read say about reasons and the file:

• The reason, in writing. Section 62 gives a right to the dominant reason for a refusal to enter into a credit agreement, as above. Whether it reaches a refused pre-approval is not clear from the text we read.
• The credit report. The National Credit Regulator says consumers are entitled to one free credit report a year from any of the four bureaus it lists: Experian, TransUnion, XDS and Consumer Profile Bureau. Section 72(1)(b) of the Act as gazetted gives every person a right to inspect a credit bureau file without charge once within any period of twelve months. Neither wording says whether that is one report per bureau or one in all, so the bureau is the one to ask. The Regulator says consumers can dispute errors with the bureau, and to go to the Credit Ombud only if the bureaus cannot help.
• What the assessment looks at. Section 81(2) covers understanding of the credit, repayment history and existing financial means, prospects and obligations. What a consumer already owes each month is part of that.
• Deposit and joint applications. A larger deposit means a smaller loan for the same price, and a joint application puts a second income and a second set of debts into the assessment. Whether either changes a bank's answer is the bank's decision. How much deposit you need has the detail.
• First Home Finance. It is a once-off housing finance subsidy run by the National Housing Finance Corporation. The Department of Human Settlements' statement of 27 February 2023 says it replaces the earlier FLISP programme. The NHFC's page says applicants need an approval in principle for a home loan from an NCR-registered lender or another approved partner, so a decline matters here too. Eligibility and amounts are in the first-time buyer guide.
• Each full application. SA Home Loans says a full application is a hard inquiry that may affect your credit score.