They take advantage of the net to educate themselves, then go to a lender or a mortgage broker to get their loan off-line. Mortgage web sites that depend on transactions to generate revenue are having a tough time. Probably the most important reason why so few borrowers transact on line is that so few of them have the confidence to go through the process alone. Most want help from an expert who will be accountable to them. The Help Desks and Chat Rooms that some sites offer are not an adequate substitute for a loan counselor with an interest in getting the deal done.
Niches carry different interest rates, points, and down payment and other underwriting requirements.
To find the niche in which a particular borrower falls, a great deal of information must be collected from that borrower. Borrowers resist the tedious inputting of information required to place them in the proper niche. People on the net usually have short attention spans, they don t understand why all the information is needed, and many suspect that it isn t. To some degree, therefore, every mortgage site caters to the impatience of users by limiting the information they request. But even a truncated list is too long for many users.