The Yahoo view: Freedom Mortgage offers a variety of loan programs and home-buying resources, but it ranks below average in customer satisfaction and has fewer incentives for borrowers than competing mortgage lenders.
Freedom Mortgage Corporation is a national lender offering mortgage loans in all 50 states and several U.S. territories. The company provides various loan products, including conventional, FHA, VA, and USDA loans, as well as both purchase and refinance loans.
Freedom isn’t known for its customer satisfaction, though. According to J.D. Power, the company ranks below average for customer satisfaction in both mortgage origination and mortgage servicing.
Read more: The different types of mortgage loans
Key benefits
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Freedom Mortgage offers various mortgage products, including conventional, FHA, VA, and USDA loans.
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There are also several refinancing programs, with both streamline and cash-out options.
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The lender’s resources are robust, offering several calculators, guides, checklists, and other helpful information for borrowers.
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The company originates mortgages in all 50 states, as well as Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.
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If you buy a home through a Freedom Homes partner real estate agent, you can get a $1,000 lender credit — if you buy and sell with Freedom Homes, you can get the $1,000 credit plus 1% off the purchase price on agent commissions.
Need to know
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You can’t get home equity products like HELOCs or home equity loans through Freedom Mortgage. The only way to access your equity is via a cash-out refinance.
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The lender has no physical branches. You’ll need to apply online or over the phone with a Freedom loan officer.
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The company ranks below average in customer satisfaction, both in servicing and origination.
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Only a small fraction of Freedom’s business is in USDA loans. The lender’s primary expertise is conventional, VA, and FHA lending.
Get started by visiting the Freedom Mortgage website.
Freedom Mortgage offers:
Freedom Mortgage does not offer:
Keep reading: How investment property loans work
Freedom Mortgage offers several types of FHA loans. In fact, FHA loans account for over a quarter of the lender’s total business, according to 2023 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data.
At Freedom, you can get an FHA purchase loan, FHA refinance, or FHA cash-out refinance. The lender even offers FHA Streamline Refinances, which allow for a faster, easier refinancing process with no home appraisal if you already have an FHA loan. Freedom requires a 550 credit score for most FHA mortgages.
Learn more: Best FHA loan lenders
You can also get a VA loan through Freedom Mortgage. These are loans for military members, veterans, and their families, requiring no down payment or mortgage insurance.
Freedom offers VA purchase loans, VA cash-out refinances, and VA IRRRLs (another term for VA streamline refinances). The minimum credit score on most is 550, and you can get a cash-out VA refinance for up to 90% of your home’s value. VA loans account for about 13% of all Freedom’s origination business.
Read more: Best VA loan lenders
Freedom Mortgage doesn’t offer home equity loans or home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) for homeowners. However, it does provide cash-out refinancing — another tool you can use to borrow from your home equity. The lender offers conventional, VA, and FHA cash-out options.
With a cash-out refinance, you apply for a new mortgage loan larger than your current balance. Then, the new loan is used to pay off the old one, and you get the difference back in cash. You can use the funds however you’d like, though many put them toward home improvements or paying off debts.
Dig deeper: What is a cash-out refinance, and how does it work?
Freedom Mortgage is not very forthcoming with its interest rates. There are no advertised or sample interest rates anywhere on its website, and to get a rate quote, you’ll need to call the lender directly or fill out Freedom’s online prequalification application. This is the case for all loan types and programs.
Learn more: 5 ways to get the lowest mortgage rates possible
Yahoo Finance uses 2023 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data of 10 million home loan applications to score mortgage lenders on issued interest rates and total loan costs. We score each lender on a scale of 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest).
For example, regarding mortgage interest rates, a lender with a lower score charged a higher-than-median mortgage interest rate for loans issued in 2023. A higher score indicates that a lender granted borrowers lower-than-median home loan interest rates in 2023.
With total home loan costs, a lower score would indicate that a lender charged higher-than-median total home loan costs in 2023. A high rating would mean that a mortgage lender offered lower-than-median all-in home loan costs in 2023.
What this means: Freedom Mortgage offered a higher-than-median mortgage rate of 6.75% and a high total loan cost of $12,003.20 to borrowers in 2023.
Freedom Mortgage doesn’t have physical branches you can visit to apply in person, but it does offer online and over-the-phone mortgage applications. To start the process, call 888-369-3719 and speak to a loan officer, or fill out an application online. The online application will require information about the property you’re buying, your personal details, your down payment amount, your income, and more.
We couldn’t find a preapproval process on Freedom’s website, but the lender does offer prequalification. Generally speaking, prequalification is a lighter lift than preapproval, requiring only some basic information about your finances and homebuying goals, while preapproval asks for financial documents and other verification tools.
With prequalification, you’ll get an estimate of how much you can potentially borrow for your home purchase, which can help you determine what price range to shop in. Preapproval, on the other hand, is more official, indicating you’ll likely get approved for your loan — as long as you meet certain conditions.
At Freedom, you can get prequalified for a mortgage in two ways: either by applying online or by calling a loan officer. In both scenarios, you’ll need to answer a few questions about your income, down payment, and other financial factors, as well as the home you’re looking to buy. You’ll also need to agree to a credit check, too. From there, you’ll get a prequalification letter lasting up to 90 days.
Read more: How mortgage prequalification works
As far as online tools go, Freedom offers quite a few. There’s a home affordability calculator, which helps you estimate your home-buying budget based on your income, debts, and other details. There are also mortgage payment, cash-out, refinancing, closing cost, and down payment calculators. There’s even a calculator for comparing 15- and 30-year mortgage options, and one specifically for VA loan refinancing.
The lender also offers a robust FAQ section, a learning center, various checklists, a mortgage glossary, and an informative blog. Once you become a customer, you can manage your account online.
Learn more: Use Yahoo Finance’s free mortgage calculator
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Robust online features: Freedom offers a wide variety of online calculators, lots of articles, checklists, FAQs, and a glossary, among other helpful features. It gets 4 stars in our Online Features category.
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Widely available: Borrowers in all 50 states can get a loan through Freedom Mortgage.
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Unclear rates: Freedom has no advertised or sample rates for potential borrowers to view. Instead, you’ll need to contact a loan officer directly, giving it 3 stars for Rate Transparency.
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Lacking affordable options: The lender has several government-backed loan options, conventional loans, and both purchase and refinance loans. However, it doesn’t have features such as down payment assistance, home equity loans, or HELOCs, giving it 2 stars in Affordability.
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High rates and fees: According to government data, Freedom’s interest rates and fees are higher than industry averages.
Read more: How does down payment assistance work?
Freedom Mortgage and Rocket Mortgage offer slightly different loan programs. While Rocket Mortgage has 1% down, jumbo, and home equity loans, Freedom provides USDA loans, which can be a good option for rural homebuyers.
Rocket also provides various incentives, such as grants for down payments and closing costs, and has much higher satisfaction ratings from J.D. Power. It is also more up-front about its current interest rates.
Freedom Mortgage loan options are more limited than Pennymac’s. At Pennymac, you can get conventional, FHA, VA, USDA, jumbo, or home equity loans, and there are interest-rate buydown options. The company also has a variety of closing cost incentives. However, it comes in dead last in the latest J.D. Power customer satisfaction rankings (Freedom rates slightly higher, but still below the industry average).
Freedom Mortgage has had several regulatory actions filed against it in recent years, including one from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau regarding illegal kickbacks. The company also ranks below average in J.D. Power’s customer satisfaction rankings.
Yes, Freedom Mortgage is a legitimate company. It originates mortgage loans in 50 states, plus Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.
Eligibility requirements vary by loan program, but Freedom Mortgage offers loan options for borrowers with credit scores as low as 550.
Stanley C. Middleman and the Middleman family own Freedom Mortgage. The company was founded in 1990.
According to the latest J.D. Power customer satisfaction ratings, Freedom Mortgage is ranked below average among mortgage originators. Of the 22 lenders analyzed in the study, only six rank lower than Freedom.
Methodology:
Yahoo Finance reviews and scores mortgage lenders with quintile scoring in five primary categories: 1) Interest rates. Using 2023 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data comprised of 10 million home loan applications, we score mortgage lenders on issued mortgage rates below or above the annual median of reporting lenders. 2) Affordability. A measure of loan product availability and the willingness of a lender to offer government-backed loans, low down payments, down payment assistance, and consideration of nontraditional credit. 3) Loan costs. HMDA data is again analyzed, and lenders are rated based on total loan costs compared to the annual median. 4) Rate transparency. The ability of a website user to obtain a mortgage interest rate estimate. We score lenders based on whether rates are enhanced with discount points or high credit score requirements, disclaimers revealing rate assumptions, sample advertised rates, and whether adjustable or no discount point rate estimates are available. 5) Online features. An analysis of the educational material, calculators, and additional resources available to users.
Review of Nationwide Multistate Licensing System (NMLS) data on regulatory actions can trigger a penalty to the score of any lender with a consumer mortgage-related administrative or enforcement action within the past five years.
Advertisers or sponsorships do not influence ratings.
Editorial disclosure for mortgages:
The information in this article has not been reviewed or approved by any advertiser. The details on financial products, including interest rates and fees, are accurate as of the publish date. All products or services are presented without warranty. Check the lender’s website for the most current information. This site doesn’t include all currently available offers.
This article was edited by Laura Grace Tarpley.
