Mortgage broker for women after separation, Sydney
Meet Rielle Berglund: helping women buy a home through a major life change
Most of the women who find me are asking some version of the same quiet question: can I even do this right now?
Right now, meaning in the middle of a separation. A year after losing a partner. While they are still working out how to leave. Their life is mid-change, the ground is moving, and somewhere along the way someone told them that buying a home, or keeping one, is off the table until everything settles down.
I am the broker who tells them the truth, which is almost always kinder than what they have been led to believe. So let me answer that question properly, and introduce myself while I do.
Can you get a home loan while your life is in transition?
Yes. Far more often than you have been told.
You do not have to wait until everything is perfectly settled before you even start. A great deal of the groundwork, understanding your borrowing capacity, separating your finances, cleaning up joint debts, getting your income documented, can begin while the rest of your life is still being sorted out. A major life change does not automatically disqualify you from a loan.
The honest part: borrowing on one income is genuinely different to borrowing on two. Your capacity is lower, and that is worth knowing up front. But lower is not nothing. Child support and family payments, where the right lender counts them, change the picture. So does choosing a lender whose policies actually fit your situation instead of the first bank that glanced at your file and said no.
That last part matters more than almost anything. A knock-back from one lender tells you very little. Lender policies vary enormously, and the income one bank ignores can be exactly what carries your application somewhere else. Knowing who does what, for your specific circumstances, is most of my job.
Why I specialise in women in transition
I am the founder of Matilda Tree Finance, and before I became a broker I spent more than a decade in banking and small business. I am also a mum, which is relevant, because it shapes how I work and who I built this practice for.
Early on I kept seeing the same thing. Capable, organised women, mid-divorce or newly on their own, treated as an awkward edge case by an industry quietly built around two-income couples with tidy payslips. They were not difficult to help. They had just been handed to people who did not understand their situation and did not take the time to.
So I chose to specialise in them, on purpose. The women navigating separation, divorce, the loss of a partner, or the slow work of leaving a relationship that controlled the money. I built my whole practice around that work, and I built Runa, a free financial literacy app, for the same women, so the tools exist whether or not you ever pick up the phone.
What you get from me is plain language, no jargon, and no judgement, with flexible appointments that fit around school runs and bedtime rather than office hours.
The situations I help women through
I write openly about this work on the Matilda Tree blog, so you can see how I think long before you ever speak to me. A few of the situations I help women through:
Buying after divorce. My full walkthrough of timing, deposit, joint debts and what lenders look at is here: Buying a house after divorce in Australia.
Keeping the family home. If you want to stay and buy out your ex, Refinancing the family home into your name after separation explains how the buyout and serviceability actually work.
Leaving a relationship that controls the money. The practical, quiet first steps are in How to leave a financially controlling relationship, and the earliest groundwork is in Five things to do before you tell him you're leaving.
Loss and illness. For women applying in their sole name while a partner is terminally ill, or after he has passed, I wrote this guide.
Protecting yourself on paper. Before you sign anything, What every woman should check before signing a mortgage application is worth ten minutes.
If any of those sound like where you are, you are exactly who I do this for.
How I support you through the home loan, step by step
When we work together, the process is built around your situation rather than a generic checklist:
We start with honest numbers. What you can actually borrow, and which parts of your income, including child support and Family Tax Benefit, a lender will count.
We sort the timing. Much of the preparation can run alongside a property settlement, so you are ready to move the moment you can, instead of starting from scratch afterwards.
We get your finances clean. Joint debts addressed, income documented, savings in your sole name, all the things that make an application straightforward instead of stressful.
We match you to the right lender, including schemes built for single parents, like the 2 percent deposit option, where you qualify.
We get you to pre-approval, so you can make offers with confidence and know your real limit.
We structure the loan to suit you. I will explain your LVR, the size of your loan against the value of the home, and how your deposit shapes your options, and I will often set up an offset account so your money quietly works harder against the interest.
You will never be made to feel like a problem to solve. You are a person making a big decision at a hard time, and you deserve a broker who treats it that way.
Let's talk, with no pressure
If you want a private, no-pressure place to start working through your numbers on your own first, that is exactly what Runa is for. No calls, no sales pitch.
And when you are ready to talk it through, I offer free, confidential, no-obligation conversations for women looking at their options. I work with clients Australia-wide. Book a free 30-minute call, or reach out through my contact page. By the end of it, you will know what is actually possible for you, which is a far better place to make a decision from than fear.
This article is general information only and does not take into account your personal circumstances. It is not financial, legal or tax advice
Rielle Berglund is a mortgage broker and the founder of Matilda Tree Finance, working with women navigating major financial transitions including separation, divorce, terminal illness and bereavement. She is also the creator of Runa, a free financial literacy app. Matilda Tree Finance is a member of the MFAA, authorised under Purple Circle Financial Services (ACL 419 372), and a member of AFCA.