New Scroll Box Offers Window to Lenders’ Quotes

With more than 40,000 loan quotes submitted by lenders since the launch of Zillow Mortgage Marketplace a few weeks ago, we thought it was time to share some of the more interesting data we’ve compiled. Last week we opened up the marketplace even further by allowing everyone to search and view real, anonymous loan quote requests. This week, we’re taking that a step further by adding a scrolling quote box to the Zillow Mortgage Marketplace landing page to show you the latest quotes and average rates.

This new feature scrolls through newly submitted mortgage quotes, showing the loan type, annual percentage rate (APR), and time the quotes were submitted. It not only showcases the vibrancy of our marketplace, but it also highlights what types of rates are being quoted by the more than 1,300 confirmed lenders.

In addition, the Mortgage Marketplace landing page now contains average APR rates for 30-year and 15-year fixed mortgages (our most popular requests). This allows you to see at a glance the average APR rates borrowers are receiving on our site. We decided to show APR rates instead of interest rates because the APR includes both fees and insurance, making them more accurate to what a borrower will actually end up paying. They will likely be higher than the traditional interest rate, however, they provide a more accurate rate as it removes artificially low interest rates where users buy down points at closing.

We hope you enjoy the new feature and we are looking forward to creating even more ways to improve the loan shopping experience. By the way, to get near real-time advice from mortgage experts and the community, visit the Zillow Discussions section on mortgages.