diff --git a/peer/brontide.go b/peer/brontide.go
index 8d71fffe6..695a09a87 100644
--- a/peer/brontide.go
+++ b/peer/brontide.go
@@ -951,7 +951,10 @@ func (p *Brontide) readNextMessage() (lnwire.Message, error) {
 	// reading incrementally from the stream as the Lightning wire protocol
 	// is message oriented and allows nodes to pad on additional data to
 	// the message stream.
-	var rawMsg []byte
+	var (
+		nextMsg lnwire.Message
+		msgLen  uint64
+	)
 	err = p.cfg.ReadPool.Submit(func(buf *buffer.Read) error {
 		// Before reading the body of the message, set the read timeout
 		// accordingly to ensure we don't block other readers using the
@@ -964,18 +967,29 @@ func (p *Brontide) readNextMessage() (lnwire.Message, error) {
 			return readErr
 		}
 
-		rawMsg, readErr = noiseConn.ReadNextBody(buf[:pktLen])
-		return readErr
-	})
-	atomic.AddUint64(&p.bytesReceived, uint64(len(rawMsg)))
-	if err != nil {
-		return nil, err
-	}
+		// The ReadNextBody method will actually end up re-using the
+		// buffer, so within this closure, we can continue to use
+		// rawMsg as it's just a slice into the buf from the buffer
+		// pool.
+		rawMsg, readErr := noiseConn.ReadNextBody(buf[:pktLen])
+		if readErr != nil {
+			return readErr
+		}
+		msgLen = uint64(len(rawMsg))
 
-	// Next, create a new io.Reader implementation from the raw message,
-	// and use this to decode the message directly from.
-	msgReader := bytes.NewReader(rawMsg)
-	nextMsg, err := lnwire.ReadMessage(msgReader, 0)
+		// Next, create a new io.Reader implementation from the raw
+		// message, and use this to decode the message directly from.
+		msgReader := bytes.NewReader(rawMsg)
+		nextMsg, err = lnwire.ReadMessage(msgReader, 0)
+		if err != nil {
+			return err
+		}
+
+		// At this point, rawMsg and buf will be returned back to the
+		// buffer pool for re-use.
+		return nil
+	})
+	atomic.AddUint64(&p.bytesReceived, msgLen)
 	if err != nil {
 		return nil, err
 	}