Opt for home loan balance transfer or prepay to counter rising rates

Depositors should invest in short-duration fixed deposits now so that they can roll them over at higher rates in the near future

Interest rates are on their way up. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has delivered two successive rate hikes, taking the repo rate to 6.50 per cent. Last week the State Bank of India (SBI) hiked its retail deposit rates by 5-10 basis points (bps), so that its one-year fixed deposit rate now stands at 6.7 per cent. Several banks like Union, Kotak and Karnataka also hiked their marginal cost of funds based lending rates (MCLR) by 5-10 bps, which will push their home loan rates up. Both borrowers and depositors need to recalibrate their loan and deposit strategies to