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Zillow launches new mortgage marketplace

Zillow is taking the wraps off its new service today, the Mortgage Marketplace.

Designed as a meeting ground between mortgage borrowers and lenders, Zillow Mortgage Marketplace aims to solve most of the common complaints that borrowers and lenders have with the normal mortgage process.

For starters, the marketplace does not require that borrowers provide extensive personal information up front. In place of personal information are detailed loan request forms, where you can customize the offering you are looking for. When a lender sends a quote, you are alerted by e-mail to view, then accept or decline, the customized offer.

Lenders can register for a small fee; once registered, they can submit quotes to potential borrowers, and view any competing quotes for the same borrower. Zillow requires full disclosure from the lender; that is, any quote must include all fees, as well as estimates of taxes, insurance, the whole kit and kaboodle.

The Mortgage Marketplace is an excellent idea. It allows the borrower to shop extensively without having to reveal all of their personal information, and saves them the time of filling out form after form. Zillow's full disclosure policy insures that there will be no surprise costs. Lenders will also benefit from having a large pool to pull customers from for a relatively low cost.

The question is: is anybody even buying a house right now?

[via CNet]

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