Americans spent on average five hours shopping for a home loan, about the same time as they did for the family vacation, according to Thursday’s release of Zillow’s Mortgage Marketplace Survey.
The results from the online survey say we spent an average of 40 hours searching for a home, 10 hours for a car and four hours for a computer.
If you assume a $146,000 loan on a median-price U.S. home (after a 20-percent down payment), that works out to allotting $29,000 toward each hour of research. In comparison, a typical U.S. vacation works out to about $340 allotted to each hour of shopping, according to Zillow.
Nearly a third of those surveyed said they spent two hours or less shopping for a home loan, about the same time on average as for selecting a television.
Borrowers report they are spending no more time researching a home loan today than they did in 2008, according to Zillow. Those who obtained a loan in the past five years are soliciting fewer quotes — an average of three quotes versus four in 2008.
Here is a link to the Zillow press release.
— Robert Digitale