By Saurabh Garg, founder·10 min read·Published 2026-09-07

Short answer: RBI sets one number on an NRI home loan and it is the loan-to-value ratio: 90% up to ₹30 lakh, 80% from ₹30 lakh to ₹75 lakh, 75% above ₹75 lakh. No regulator sets an income multiple, a FOIR, a maximum tenure or an age cap. Those come from the lending board of each bank, which is why two banks quote you different amounts on the same salary. FEMA requires that the quantum, the margin and the repayment period be at par with a resident borrower, so anything worse is the lender choosing, not the law requiring.

How Much Home Loan Can an NRI Get in India

RBI sets one number on an NRI home loan and it is the loan-to-value ratio: 90% up to ₹30 lakh, 80% from ₹30 lakh to ₹75 lakh, 75% above ₹75 lakh. No regulator sets an income multiple, a FOIR, a maximum tenure or an age cap. Those come from the lending board of each bank, which is why two banks quote you different amounts on the same salary. FEMA requires that the quantum, the margin and the repayment period be at par with a resident borrower, so anything worse is the lender choosing, not the law requiring.

Verified against the RBI Master Circular and the FEMA notifications on 7 September 2026.

The one number the regulator sets

The Master Circular on Housing Finance, RBI/2025-26/16, dated 1 April 2025, carries the ceiling in paragraph 3(a).

Loan amount Maximum loan-to-value
Up to ₹30 lakh 90%
Above ₹30 lakh and up to ₹75 lakh 80%
Above ₹75 lakh 75%

Read the first row with care. Within the up-to-₹30-lakh slab, 80% carries a risk weight of 35% and anything above 80% carries 50%. The 90% figure is a ceiling the bank may reach, not an entitlement you may claim, and it costs the bank more capital to give it to you.

Nothing in that circular is written for non-residents. There is no separate NRI table, no NRI haircut and no NRI ceiling. The circular sets the same slabs for everybody.

What the cost of the house means

Paragraph 3(b) of the same circular tells banks not to include stamp duty, registration and other documentation charges in the cost of the property they finance, so that the effectiveness of the LTV norm is not diluted.

This is the line that surprises a first-time buyer. On a ₹1 crore flat in Bengaluru or Pune, stamp duty and registration run to several lakh, and none of it counts toward the number the bank divides by. You fund it from your own pocket on top of the margin. Paragraph 3(c) carves out one exception: where the cost of the unit does not exceed ₹10 lakh, the bank may add those charges in.

What no regulator sets, which is almost everything else

This is the part the search results get wrong.

There is no RBI rule fixing a multiple of annual income. There is no mandated fixed-obligation-to-income ratio. There is no EMI-to-income cap for housing loans, for residents or for non-residents. There is no maximum tenure and no maximum age at maturity anywhere in the Master Circular.

The FEMA regulation hands the decision over in plain words. Regulation 7(A)(i) of the Foreign Exchange Management (Borrowing and Lending) Regulations, 2018 lets an authorised dealer grant a loan to an NRI or an OCI cardholder for acquisition of a residential accommodation in India "as per the loan policy laid down by the Board of Directors of the AD and in compliance with prudential guidelines of Reserve Bank of India." Regulation 7(B)(i) extends the same to a registered non-banking financial company or a registered housing finance institution.

So when a site tells you an NRI gets 60 times monthly income, it is describing one lender's product sheet and calling it a rule. The same goes for a 50% or 60% FOIR cap, a 15-year tenure limit for NRIs and an age-60 maturity cap. None of them appears in an RBI instruction. They are credit policy, they differ between banks, and they are negotiable in a way a regulation is not.

The parity clause worth quoting back

FED Master Direction No. 6/2015-16, paragraph 4, sets the conditions on a housing loan to an NRI or a PIO. The first one reads that the quantum of loans, margin money and the period of repayment shall be at par with those applicable to housing finance provided to a person resident in India.

That sentence is the most useful thing on this page. If a bank offers you a shorter tenure or a bigger margin because you live abroad, the position under the Master Direction is parity. Ask the lender to point to the RBI instruction behind the difference. There is not one. There may be a sound commercial reason for their policy, and they are entitled to have one, but it is theirs and not the regulator's.

How you are allowed to repay

Paragraph 4 of the same Master Direction is specific about the money coming back. The instalment, the interest and any other charges are paid by remittance from outside India, or out of funds in your NRE, FCNR(B) or NRO account, or out of rental income from the property you bought, or by a relative in India crediting your loan account through an account-to-account transfer.

Two consequences follow. Rent from the flat can service the loan on the flat, which is the structure most owners want. And a relative can pay on your behalf without it becoming a problem, so long as the money moves account to account rather than in cash.

The loan proceeds themselves may not be credited to an NRE or FCNR(B) account, and the loan is secured by an equitable mortgage of the property, with a lien on your other Indian assets if the lender asks for it.

What the loan may not buy

An NRI or an OCI cardholder may purchase any immovable property in India other than agricultural land, plantation property or a farmhouse. RBI states this at paragraph 3.1.1 of Master Direction No. 12/2015-16, and the live source is Rule 24 of the Non-debt Instruments Rules, 2019. There is more on the boundary in our guide on whether an NRI can buy agricultural land.

Since 16 February 2026 the borrowing regulation carries its own end-use bar as well. A new Regulation 3A stops borrowed funds going into real estate business, farmhouse construction, plantation activity and transferable development rights.

What changed on 16 February 2026

Notification FEMA 3(R)(5)/2026-RB, dated 9 February 2026 and effective 16 February 2026, was put into effect through A.P. (DIR Series) Circular No. 22 of the same date. It inserted the Regulation 3A end-use restrictions above and deleted the whole of Part 2 of Master Direction No. 6, which covered residents borrowing in rupees from non-residents.

It did not touch the housing loan clause. Your entitlement to a rupee home loan is where it was.

One more thing sits out of date across the search results. During the pandemic RBI ran a concession that linked risk weights to LTV alone, without the slab structure. That concession applied to loans sanctioned up to 31 March 2023 and has lapsed. The slab table above is what is in force.

The tax side, and one line most guides get wrong

Interest on the loan is deductible under section 24(b) and principal repayment under section 80C. Neither section carries a residence condition. Section 80C opens with "an assessee, being an individual or a Hindu undivided family" and stops there.

Under the new regime in section 115BAC, most guides tell you the home loan deduction is gone. That is half right. The disallowance in section 115BAC(2)(i), as substituted by the Finance Act 2023, bites only on interest for the property referred to in section 23(2), which is the self-occupied one. Interest on a let-out property survives under the new regime. Section 80C does not, because it sits in Chapter VI-A.

The catch is one clause further down. Section 115BAC(2)(ii) bars setting a house property loss against any other head, so the interest reduces your rental income to nil and any balance is lost rather than carried against salary.

A change in your favour arrived with the Finance Act 2025, which rewrote section 23(2). The annual value of a house is nil where the owner occupies it or "cannot ... occupy it due to any reason", the ellipsis standing for a word the statute uses and the house style does not. The older text required that you be unable to occupy it owing to employment or business at another place. That condition is gone, and the limit of two such houses stays. If you have been treating an empty flat as deemed let out on the old wording, the position has moved.

From 1 April 2026 the Income-tax Act, 2025 replaces the 1961 Act, and it reproduces all of this. Section 22 carries the interest deduction with its ₹2 lakh cap, section 123 carries the principal, and section 202 carries the same regime restrictions.

What to settle before you sign

  1. Ask for the sanction in writing with the tenure, the margin and the LTV stated. Compare it against the slab your loan size falls in.
  2. Ask which of the lender's terms come from RBI and which come from their board. The answer separates a rule from a preference.
  3. Confirm the repayment route on paper: which account, and whether rent from the flat may service it.
  4. Check the registered mobile number on the loan account is one you can receive a message on from where you live. This is the same failure that locks owners out of tax portals.

FAQ

How much home loan can an NRI get in India?

There is no regulated maximum tied to income. RBI caps the loan-to-value ratio at 90% up to ₹30 lakh, 80% from ₹30 lakh to ₹75 lakh and 75% above ₹75 lakh, and everything beyond that ceiling is the individual bank's credit policy. Two lenders can and do quote different amounts on identical income.

Is there an RBI rule that an NRI gets 60 times monthly income?

No. No RBI instruction sets an income multiple for a housing loan, for a resident or a non-resident. The figure comes from lender product sheets. FEMA leaves the quantum to the loan policy laid down by the board of the lending institution.

Do NRIs get a lower loan-to-value ratio than residents?

Not under the rules. The Master Circular slabs apply to everyone, and FEMA Master Direction No. 6 requires the quantum, margin and repayment period to be at par with a resident borrower. A lower offer is that lender's policy, and you are entitled to ask them to name the instruction behind it.

Can rent from the flat repay the loan on it?

Yes. The Master Direction lists rental income from the property acquired as a permitted source, alongside remittance from outside India and debits to an NRE, FCNR(B) or NRO account. A relative in India may also pay by account-to-account transfer to the loan account.

Does stamp duty count toward the amount the bank finances?

No. RBI tells banks to exclude stamp duty, registration and documentation charges from the cost of the property when working out the LTV, so you fund them yourself on top of the margin. The one exception is a unit costing ₹10 lakh or less.

Can I claim the home loan interest deduction under the new tax regime?

For a let-out property, yes. The restriction in section 115BAC applies to interest on a self-occupied property. What you cannot do under the new regime is set the resulting house property loss against salary or any other head, and section 80C on the principal is not available.

Sources

Saurabh Garg, founder, 66 MG Road

Information on this page is as on 2026-09-07. Rules, rates, deadlines and government portals change without notice, so verify against the official source before you act. This page is for information only. It is not tax or legal advice, and it is not a substitute for a qualified adviser who knows your position.