The Irish subsidiary of Australian listed financial services group Pepper, which began offering home loans here earlier this year, has cut it variable mortgage rates by up to 0.45 percentage points for residential customers.

Pepper Homeloans’s variable rates now start at 3.1 per cent, one of the lowest in the Irish market.

Buy-to-let rates have been revised to as low as 4.4 per cent.

"Today's rate change will help cement our position as a highly competitive modern alternative for lending in Ireland that brings competition and choice for Irish borrowers wanting to switch their mortgage, refinance or take out their first home loan," said Pepper Ireland chief executive Paul Doddrell.

Pepper Ireland was established in 2012 and employs more than 400 people in Shannon and Dublin. Its lending division, Pepper Homeloans, was launched in January 2016.