The online mortgage industry is chock full of online platforms that match buyers and lenders. Although lending has slowed and credit is tight, sites like LendingTree, Bankrate, SmartHippo and other sites still provide a valuable marketplace for finding mortgages for those who still qualify. LendingTree, which was spun off from parent company IAC in 2007, is overhauling its site to offer more than just mortgages; the site is also trying to be a personal finance guide for consumers, sort of along the lines of what Mint.com does, but targeted towards real estate.
The new site is adding a bunch of new tools to help potential buyers improve and monitor their financial health. The site’s MoneyRight feature helps you create a budget, offers tips on how to reduce expenses, calculates your financial health and categorizes your spending. MyCredit will monitor your credit reports and alert you when your score changes. Ask the Tree is a personal finance question and answer tool where you can get any money questions answered by a professional. Though Ask the Tree isn’t really the most reassuring name for a personal finance information source.
The site is also adding several mortgage and loan-focused tools such as a Refinance Payment Calculator, which will determine if you should refinance your current home or consider buying a new one; and a Lender Scorecard, which give you detailed rankings of LendingTree lenders with customer reviews.
It’s not surprising that LendingTree is making a move towards becoming more than just a mortgage marketplace. Now more than ever, consumers are looking to improve their financial health and educate themselves on the best practices. But I’m not sure if consumers will know to look to LendingTree for advice and resources on financial health considering its brand as a mortgage marketplace. It may be tough to become the new Mint.com.
I’ve recommended many of my friends and clients to LendingTree in the past and they have always thanked me.
This is amazing. do you think???????????????
I don’t understand why they would run display ads next to their offer. Did they want convert customers or make sure they are distracted by the advertising?
For the love of god someone please help them…
I made the horrible mistake of contacting Lending Tree last year when I was looking at a house. They tried to get me to sign all sorts of stuff before even giving me a Good Faith Estimate. They were so obviously corrupt it was ridiculous and didn’t care what I wanted at all. If they were the only way to get a home loan.. I would rent for the rest of my life rather than deal with them again.
Not so related, but I use this space to reiterate my love to Mint.com
Although the mortgage industry might be full of platforms to match consumers and lenders, I think the ones that really deliver the promise are getting smaller.
Actually, I am not sure the cast is much deeper than the ones you list. LendingTree is impressive because they were one of the origianl and are still striving to innovate. I think Bankrate has great leadership and SmartHippo.com has a killer community approach.
I think this market is really going to shake out the best.
If you like LendingTree, you’ll love Quizzle.com. It’s LendingTree on steroids. Beyond home loan recommendations and personal budgeting tools, Quizzle gives you a free credit report and free credit score so you can better understand where you stand financially and how things like credit affect your home loan options.
One-off tools only get you so far. Your home, money and credit are all connected. Quizzle is a tool that connects the dots for you. And the best part? It’s free.
Thomas,
When next you need a mortgage, check out Zillow:
1) Your loan request is anonymous. No jumping through hoops to get a customized quote that you can “take to the bank.”
2) There’s no limit to the number of quotes you can receive from our network of 5,000 lenders.
3) Loan quotes on Zillow include the fees you see on a GFE — Zillow Mortgage Marketplace is a powerful tool for making apples-to-apples comparisons between lenders.
4) Lenders on Zillow are reviewed by borrowers who have used them so you can base your decision to contact a lender both on the strength of their quote AND on their reputation.
… and because loan quotes on Zillow are totally transparent, it’s the one place that lenders truly do compete for your business online and where honest lenders are avidly working to clean up the marketplace. Check it out (I linked to ZMM in my sig. above.)
Thanks for the great article on our new LendingTree.com site launch. This was a monumental effort, and I’m glad that you noticed the work we have done. You’re right that consumers may not know to look to LendingTree for help outside of their mortgages yet, but we are going to change that. The recent economic chaos has left us all a little unsure about who to trust with our finances. At LendingTree we feel the best person to trust is really yourself, and we are relaunching LendingTree to be your ally with the advice, tools, and products you need to take control of your financial life. And this site launch was only the beginning. We have lots more planned for the coming months, so stay tuned.
Excellent! This is something we want to do at elMejorTrato.com. Help everyone who doesn’t know anything about the financial world.
Great Post!