Small lenders take bigger share of fixed rate mortgage market Smaller lenders are successfully pushing into the market for fixed-rate home loans. Smaller lenders are making an aggressive push into the market for fixed-rate home loans, with new figures showing lenders outside the big four banks pinched a significant number of new customers last year. The jump has come as competition the fixed-rate market continues to heat up, with the National Australia Bank the latest lender to cut fixed rates in an attempt to win new business. Figures from the mortgage broker AFG on Monday showed smaller lenders" share of new fixed-rate loans surged over 2013, from 13.6 per cent in February to 38.2 per cent in December. ING Direct and ME Bank had the biggest market share of the smaller lenders in December, with 7.4 per cent and 7.2 per cent, respectively. Separately, NAB said it would drop rates on its three and four-year fixed loans, giving it the lowest or equal-lowest rates for these products among the big four banks. NAB's latest change will take the interest rate on its four-year fixed loan to 5.44 per cent, which the bank says is its lowest point since 1993. Its three-year loan has been cut to 5.14 per cent, equalling the Commonwealth Bank's pricing. Jump in competition AFG, the country's largest mortgage broker, said there had been a significant jump in competition for home loan customers in 2013, with non-majors" share of the market increasing significantly. ""2013 saw competition really heating up the market in a way we haven't seen since before the GFC,"" AFG's general manager of sales and operations, Mark Hewitt, said. ""The non-majors have been agile and focused on service delivery, targeting specific borrowers, and using very attractive fixed rate deals to great effect."" The rise in competition has come as more consumers flock to fixed-rate loans, which reflect market bets on the future level of official interest rates. In November, fixed-rate loans accounted for 17.4 per cent of all new mortgages approved, official figures show. NAB economists are forecasting the Reserve Bank will this year cut the cash rate further from its current record low of 2.5 per cent. AFG, a wholesale aggregator to mortgage brokers, arranges about 10 per cent of new mortgages in the Australian market.