[HN Gopher] Show HN: I built a dashboard to compare mortgage rat...
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Show HN: I built a dashboard to compare mortgage rates across 120
credit unions
When I bought my home, the big bank I'd been using for years quoted
me 7% APR. A local credit union was offering 5.5% for the exact
same mortgage. I was surprised until I learned that mortgages are
basically standardized products - the government buys almost all of
them (see Bits About Money:
https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/mortgages-are-a-manuf...).
So what's the price difference paying for? A recent Bloomberg Odd
Lots episode makes the case that it's largely advertising and
marketing (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/audio/2025-11-28/odd-
lots-thi...). Credit unions are non-profits without big marketing
budgets, so they can pass those savings on, but a lot of people
don't know about them. I built this dashboard to make it easier to
shop around. I pull public rates from 120+ credit union websites
and compares against the weekly FRED national benchmark. Features:
- Filter by loan type (30Y/15Y/etc.), eligibility (the hardest part
tbh), and rate type - Payment calculator with refi mode (CUs can be
a bit slower than big lenders, but that makes them great for refi)
- Links to each CU's rates page and eligibility requirements -
Toggle to show/hide statistical outliers At the time of writing,
the average CU rate is 5.91% vs. 6.23% national average. about $37k
difference in total interest on a $500k loan. I actually used
seaborn to visualize the rate spread against the four big banks:
https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/1pcj9t7/oc...
Stack: Python for the data/backend, Svelte/SvelteKit for the
frontend. No signup, no ads, no referral fees. Happy to answer
questions about the methodology or add CUs people suggest.
Author : mhashemi
Score : 38 points
Date : 2025-12-03 20:35 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (finfam.app)
(TXT) w3m dump (finfam.app)
| msuniverse2026 wrote:
| God I wish we had 30 year fixed mortgages here in Australia.
| Imagine getting one of those during covid when rates were below
| 3%. Incredible.
| mhashemi wrote:
| Haha, wait until you hear about our fancy 50-year mortgages
| we'll be getting any day now!
|
| But seriously, my favorite discovery when researching CU
| mortgages is the prevalence of the 15/15 ARM. It's fixed for 15
| years, and then adjusts once. Most people refinance within 7
| years, or move within 12. So it's like a 30Y fixed, but comes
| in at 20 basis points cheaper (0.2% lower APR).
| denimnerd42 wrote:
| just makes the prices higher... you qualify for a house based
| on ratio of income to payment. so the demand is heavily
| influenced by the type of financing available..
|
| Other than natural demand, Australia has a high real estate
| market due to the tax and a superannuation/pension distortions.
| Should try to fix those first. (probably impossible)
| cortesoft wrote:
| And as I pointed out in a sibling comment, it can lock you
| into your house if interest rates go up. We can't afford to
| sell our house because the extra interest costs would
| increase our monthly payment by 50% even if the house cost
| the exact same as our current one.
| cortesoft wrote:
| There are downsides.
|
| I have a really great rate on my mortgage, but our house is
| super expensive and small for our family... but now we can't
| afford to move.
|
| If we moved to a new house, we would have to pay off this great
| mortgage and get a new one, at a much higher interest rate.
| Even if we found a house that cost the exact same as ours, the
| monthly payment would be 50% higher, because current interest
| rates are more than twice what we have. We are locked into our
| house.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Do 30-year mortgages make the other houses more expensive
| somehow? It sounds like you got a good deal and any change
| would be worse than the good deal you got. I'd appreciate it
| if I was you.
|
| Edit: unless you mean that the downside of 30-year mortgages
| is you hardly get to pay off the principal in the first
| several years and don't build much equity maybe? That's more
| a "long mortgages" thing.
| aliljet wrote:
| This is absolutely fantastic. I wish this included commercial
| loans like DSCRs...
| mhashemi wrote:
| Thanks! Re: DSCRs, point me to the data!
| ambicapter wrote:
| "Rates" dropdown doesn't seem to work. I'm using uBlock Origin.
| mhashemi wrote:
| Pushing a fix to this now. Assuming we're seeing the same
| thing: clicking the checkbox doesn't work, but clicking the
| label should. Should be right as rain shortly. Thanks!
| bluGill wrote:
| My credit union gives me better rates if I'm "active", which
| means some number of transactions per month. Thus you really need
| to pick a credit union and start using them a few months before
| if you want the best rates. (maybe, depending on how that credit
| union works)
| mhashemi wrote:
| Yeah, there's a somewhat wide variance in CUs, in terms of
| rates, quality of service, etc. I called a few just to spot
| check and these public rates are supposedly about as good as
| they can do. From what I gather, even the large CUs (like
| Transportation FCU) just don't have that sophisticated of an
| operating model.
| xnx wrote:
| > No signup, no ads, no referral fees.
|
| Nice
| latortuga wrote:
| It's always fun to open the front page of HN and see a familiar
| face. I went to college with this guy! Congrats on shipping
| Mahmoud!
| mhashemi wrote:
| Haha, my uncreative username betrays me once again. Small
| world! Congrats on founding to you, too!
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(page generated 2025-12-03 23:00 UTC)