Best Mortgage Lender Overall

Methodology:

All reviewed mortgage lenders in 2023 were evaluated against the criteria below. The lender with the highest raw score is our Best Mortgage Lender Overall:
  • 1. Rates/fees.
  • 2. Rate transparency.
  • 3. Variety of loan types.
  • 4. Ease of application.
Tiebreaker:
  • 1. Lender with the lowest origination fees.

How we picked the lenders to evaluate:

NerdWallet reviewed more than 50 mortgage lenders in 2023, including the majority of the largest U.S. mortgage lenders by annual loan volume (measured among lenders with at least a 1% market share), lenders with significant online search volume and those that specialize in serving various audiences across the country. We rated them on criteria including rate transparency, loan types offered, ease of application and more.
Some of the providers are NerdWallet partners, but this did not influence our selection of the winner.

How we chose the winner:

We started by pooling all of our reviewed lenders. The winner is the mortgage lender that had the highest raw score when evaluated against NerdWallet's overall mortgage lender star-rating rubric: rates/fees (25%), online mortgage rate information (25%), variety of loan types (25%) and ease of application (25%). In the event of a tie, the winner must charge the lowest origination fees.

How we verified our data:

NerdWallet solicits information from reviewed lenders on a recurring basis throughout the year. All lender-provided information is verified through lender websites and interviews. We also utilized 2021 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, or HMDA, data for origination volume, origination fee, interest rate and share-of-product data.