Good times are over for mortgage holders Stuart and Bree McGraw with Scarlett, 3, and Ruby, 2. Picture: Justin Lloyd Source: The Daily Telegraph THE party may be over for Australia's mortgage holders, with previous predictions of further interest rate cuts this year beginning to evaporate. Having enjoyed a blissful period of record-low interest rates, households have been warned not to count on any more cuts in 2013. And if the Reserve Bank is forced to make one last trim to its official cash rate in the coming months, the stimulus will be shortlived - interest rates are widely forecast to rise in 2014. The Reserve Bank board will meet today to decide its direction. Any movement, up or down, is highly unlikely, according to The Daily Telegraph's board of experts. In fact, the majority of our nine-member expert panel believe the Reserve is done cutting rates and will soon set about lifting them back into a more neutral setting, courtesy of a stumbling economy starting to find its feet, and increasingly positive sentiments on the sharemarkets. Chief economist of HSBC Bank Australia, Paul Bloxham, believes a pre-Christmas rate hike is on the cards, followed by another in the new year. An economist for the Eureka Report, Adam Carr, thinks that rates should be increased by a quarter of a percentage point today and by another full percentage point over the coming year. Repayments on an average Sydney mortgage of $350,000 have dropped by over $900 a month since rates rose to 7.25 per cent in 2008, before the global financial crisis delivered its ugly payload. Thatslide has allowed Stuart and Bree McGraw to put extra money towards the mortgage on their Picnic Point home. But the possibility of rate rises within the year will end those extra payments. Our required payments on variable are $845 and we've been paying $1600. "So we've been trying to pump as much money into that as we can to get ahead," said Mrs McGraw. But we won't be able to pay that extra money if it increases back to something like 7 per cent. It's a change managing director of Market Economics Stephen Koukoulas said was inevitable. A strong lift in house prices - Sydney's values are now growing at an annual rate of 2.7 per cent - plus recovery in global growth and consumer confidence has even raised the risk rates could rise a full percentage point in the coming year, he said. While the majority of the major banks believe there is still room for the Reserve Bank to trim official interest rates, the Commonwealth Bank now believes rates will stay steady at 3 per cent. National Australia Bank was forced to slash its forecast rate cuts last month.