Remember Bank of New Zealand's famous "Unbeatable" campaign? It was launched in October 2004.

So, assuming any such campaigns would already be in the planning stages, we asked the major banks whether we could expect anything this year or whether such campaigns would be crunched by the global credit crisis.

As well as the "big four" Australian banks, we included the government-owned Kiwibank since it's been acting like a big bank lately and doing the lion's share of mortgage lending. It accounted for 89.7% of all new lending on mortgages by banks in the March quarter, excluding the newly registered SBS Bank, and 23.6% in the June quarter, even though its share of the mortgage market at June 30 was just 4.67%.

The banks are obviously keeping their cards close to their chests. We're still waiting to hear from BNZ and ASB Bank.
Kiwibank's answer was it's far too early to be thinking about Spring. ANZ National Bank's reply was a teasing "wait and see."

Wespac was somewhat more forthcoming: "The housing market today has evolved over the last 18 months given the economic conditions, which may mean the traditional Spring/Autumn advertising may become less applicable," says a Westpac spokeswoman.

"However, Westpac has already increased its home loan advertising in the market with TV ads running currently"