Product Review: MoneySearch Loan Search Engine

About the company: "At MoneySearch.com, we are a Loan Search Engine, and we're commited to helping you find a wide assortment of lenders and brokers. Our purpose is simple... to provide you with a simple way to find a local lender and view updated rate comparison surveys from hundreds of lenders and brokers nationwide."

The big pitch: Get quotes from multiple lenders with the lowest rates.

Yet another in a long line of money lending websites that don't actually lend you any money, but rather send your details to companies that might, at least we have to give MoneySearch.com credit for not disguising their true situation like so many others of their ilk do.

MoneySearch says it right up front - they are not a financial lender, they are a Loan Search Engine. And to that end, they do an okay job. If you only want to use their system to ensure a handful of potential lenders contact you with their offers, by all means, go to MoneySearch.com and knock yourself out .

But, and here's the rub... if we just wanted random lenders to call us, we could flip through a phonebook and call them directly, you know?

The best 'loan search engines' will take your information and give you back a stream of data on who has the best rates today, and who specializes in your area/credit situation/type of loan. They take your info and process it, giving you back a list of good stuff that you can then take the to the next level.

"Oh, it says here that Money Lenders Inc can give us a lower rate, with no money down... let's give them a call," - that's helpful. "Oh... they say four lenders will cal us sometime in the next five days..." - that's not so helpful.

At least not to me. What is helpful is the literal overload of lending information that you can find on the MoneySearch.com website. They handle a lot more than home loans - they do home equity loans, debt consolidation loans, auto loans, commercial loans, student financing, insurance, first home buyers, less then perfect credit, prequalified, credit cards, construction loans, FHA, VA, no documentation, credit repair... basically anything you could ever really want in terms of borrowing money from a bank, lender, or other associated usurer.

They have mortgage calculators, info on how to decide whether you should buy or rent, refinancing assessment tools, investment calculators, lease calculators, instant credit reports... Or rather, they don't actually have any of that... but they link to it really well.

So if you're in the early stages of deciding whether or not you're going to be a borrower, perhaps this is a good place to get all the information you'll need. And then, when you've sucked them dry of info, maybe then you can find a website that takes you to the next level, because though MoneySearch is an honest, successful, straight-up, above board company, it just doesn't do as much as, ultimately, we'd hoped it would.

The Product Trends rating: Plenty of information, but that's about all. Three stars.

To try MoneySearch.com for yourself, click the image below: