Key takeaways: 

• As home purchases slow, lending institutions can keep their pipelines full by pivoting to equity-backed products. 
• Demand for home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) is high. 
• Potential borrowers want to know what a HELOC could do for them, and that means understanding the interest rates available to them.
• HELOC rate comparison tables give lenders a way to showcase what’s on offer for each individual homeowner. 

It hasn’t been an excellent time to be in the real estate game. And that’s not just limited to agents and brokers. Mortgage lenders have been facing some dire straits. As home prices stay high, homeowners are staying put and new buyers are slow to enter the market. 

Fortunately for lending institutions, purchase loans aren’t the only option on the table. By shifting attention to equity-backed borrowing — and particularly home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) — you get a way to keep you loan officers busy and revenue up. 

More good news: marketing your HELOC offering is easier than ever before. With our new HELOC rate comparison table, you can show homeowners what’s available to them without any extra effort from your team. 

Tapping into the demand for HELOCs

High home prices have kept a lot of current homeowners from making moves. And they’ve been slowing new buyers, even with rents at higher-than-normal levels. In fact, the share of first-time homebuyers making up the market hit a historic low last year, per data from the National Association of REALTORS®.  

That’s put a large share of purchase loans on ice. But things are notably sunnier for HELOCs and home equity loans. 

Because a lot of homeowners are choosing to stay put, they’re looking for new ways to free up the money they have tied up in their house. The Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) conducted a Borrower Insights Survey last year. It found that roughly one in four people are thinking about borrowing against their home equity in the next year. 

And people aren't just dreaming. They’re making moves. TransUnion highlighted home equity lending in its Q1 2026 Credit Industry Insights Report. The data showed that home equity originations were up more than 12% year over year, with HELOCs leading the pack. Specifically, HELOC originations jumped 20% year over year.

And we’re not talking small potatoes here, either. The average homeowner is sitting on more than $300,000 of equity. That’s money people could be using to pay off high interest debt, fund education, start their own businesses, improve their homes, and more. 

The key for lending institutions is somewhat simple: Show people what their home equity can do for them and what it would mean to tap it.

Bridging the gap between homeowners’ dreams and reality

Plenty of homeowners wish they had more money. Fewer know how their home equity can provide it. Data shows that about 30% of homeowners can’t correctly explain a HELOC. 

We think lenders’ marketing plays a role here. There’s a wealth of information available about purchase loans, complete with live rate tables and calculators. All of this empowers people to make smart decisions during their homebuying journey.

But there’s a notable gap in the home equity space. If lenders have HELOC rates advertised, they’re probably promotional ones (e.g., “Rates as low as…”). Without a solid understanding of these lines of credit and what they would cost, a lot of homeowners don’t take next steps. 

But let’s circle back to that ICE data. One in four homeowners are thinking about borrowing against their equity. The intent is there. You have the opportunity to turn it into action. 

Capturing HELOC intent for your lending institution

Lending institutions can capitalize on all of this by working to demystify HELOCs. Showing homeowners exactly what’s available to them goes a long way. Instead of presenting generic product information, make real HELOC rate data available (we’ll explain how in the next section). 

This way, people don’t just have to guess at how this line of credit would work. They’re familiar with credit cards. Knowing their rough HELOC rate helps them understand what this alternative source of revolving credit could fund. 

By providing homeowners with rate-shopping tools, you let people know what they could get. That equips them with the information they need to take next steps, like completing a lead workflow. 

This is a huge opportunity for lending teams right now. Even large national lenders only have scant information about HELOCs. By stepping in to provide rates, you help to close that knowledge gap. That shows homeowners that your team cares about partnering with them to help them toward their goals. It helps to position your loan officers as trusted advisors. And those warm relationships make it easier to close these lines of credit. 

Setting up HELOC rate tables the easy way

You may think this all sounds well and good, but still not worth the hassle. Getting a HELOC rate table up and running on your site would require a lot of work, right? Not anymore. 

In fact, what if we told you it didn’t have to be a hassle at all? We’ve designed the BankingBridge HELOC rate comparison table to be plug-and-play for lenders. You just need to connect it to your pricing engine. And we’ve streamlined integrations with all the major players, from Optimal Blue to Polly. 

Then, the rate table pulls live data from your pricing engine. You don’t need to worry about manually updating data or personalizing it to individual leads. The homeowner can toggle options on the rate table, like the amount they want to borrow, to see what kind of HELOC rates your team can offer them. 

And they’re not just getting a stab-in-the-dark promotional rate. Because it uses real rate data from your pricing engine, the rate table gives people an accurate view. That way, when they reach out to your team, they’re informed about what’s on offer and ready to take next steps. 

Don’t let a slowdown in purchase loans hurt your bottom line. Capture more HELOC demand from the homeowners who are already considering tapping their equity. Book a demo and we can show you how the HELOC rate comparison table works.

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