Print this document This Privacy Notice describes the privacy practices of Freedom Mortgage d/b/a HELOC.com ("HELOC.com", "Our", "Us" or "We"). HELOC.com is committed to maintaining the privacy and confidentiality of your personal information.
This Privacy Notice describes how we collect personal information from you, what personal information we collect about you on our websites and mobile application and how we disclose, use, share and protect your personal information.
Please read this Privacy Notice carefully. This Privacy Notice governs how information is collected by and through the HELOC.com Website and Mobile Application (collectively referred to as "the Site") and how that information may be used and shared. By accessing or using any HELOC.com Site, you agree to the collection, use and disclosure of information in accordance with this Privacy Notice. You also agree that you have read and understood the Terms of Use for our website which are incorporated by reference into this Privacy Notice.
If you are a California resident, please also read our California Privacy Notice.
How we collect information about you?
We collect information about you that you provide to us directly through the course of providing mortgage and loan origination services and through your use of the Site. For example, we collect information when you:
- apply for a mortgage loan,
- request assistance,
- request information about a product or service we offer,
- use our mobile application,
- respond to surveys, and/or
- when you otherwise communicate with Us.
Occasionally we gather additional necessary information from public records, credit bureaus, or third parties. We may also collect personal information about you from the following categories of sources: advertising networks, internet service providers, data analytics providers, government entities, operating systems and platforms, social networks, and data brokers.
We also collect information about you through your computer or mobile device by the use of cookies and similar tracking technologies. Please refer to the section titled Web Technologies for additional information.
What information do we collect?
We collect both personal information and non-personally identifiable information. This includes, but is not limited to, the following:
- Contact Information such as first and last name, mailing and/or property address, phone number and email address.
- Personal Information which may include: Social Security number, account log-in, driver's license, state identification card, or passport number, credit card number, and geolocation data.
- Mortgage Application Information such as credit and financial information (e.g., income, assets), homeownership status, professional, educational and employment related information, age, location and approximate value of your property, records of loan products or services purchased, obtained, or considered and insurance information.
- Device/Online Mobile Activity Data such as network activity information, including, but not limited to, Internet Protocol (IP) address, browsing history, search history, and information regarding a consumer's interaction with the Site or advertisements.
- Communications Data like audio (e.g., call recordings), electronic (e.g., online chat messages), visual, or similar information.
- Demographic Information such as race, ethnicity and sex that is gathered pursuant to Federal law.
How do we use the information we collect?
We use personally identifiable and non-personally identifiable information that we collect from you to:
- Deliver products and services to you, including maintaining or servicing your account, processing, or fulfilling orders and transactions, verifying customer information, processing payments and providing financing.
- Respond to your inquiries, requests, or other service-related purposes.
- Communicate with you to administer the Site, including notifying you about any updates, changes, or additions to this Privacy Notice.
- Personalize your digital and mobile application experience with us by enhancing the content of the Site to your preferences or developing new products or services based on your interactions with the Site.
- Provide you with information about products or services that we think may be of interest to you.
- Comply with legal and regulatory obligations.
- Carry out any specific purposes for which we have obtained your prior consent.
- Conduct any other legitimate business activities not otherwise prohibited by law.
We may also use your information for business purposes such as:
- Monitor and analyze trends, usage and activities in connection with your use of the Site.
- Help ensure security and integrity to the extent the use of the consumer's personal information is reasonably necessary and proportionate for these purposes.
- Provide, maintain and develop new products, services and features, including debugging to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality.
- Detect and prevent fraud, identity theft and other risks to you or HELOC.com.
- Undertake internal research for technological development and demonstration.
- Commercial purposes such as marketing products and services that may be of interest to you.
How do we share your information?
We may share the information we collect about you with affiliates and non-affiliated third parties in the following situations:
- Service Providers — other companies that perform functions on our behalf.
- Government entities and others for legal or necessary purposes — to protect or enforce our rights or property; to protect your safety or the safety of others; to investigate, prevent, or take action against fraud or other illegal activities; in response to a legal process or as otherwise required by law; or in the event HELOC.com experiences a business transition or conducts a corporate transaction requiring due diligence, such as a merger, capital investment, acquisition by another company or sale of all or a portion of its assets.
- Credit Reporting Agencies (commonly known as "Credit Bureaus") such as Experian, Transunion, and Equifax, to furnish information about your account or learn about your financial history and for other lawful purposes.
- To conduct any other legitimate business activities not otherwise prohibited by law with advertising networks, internet service providers, data analytics providers, government entities, operating systems and platforms, social networks, and data brokers.
Notwithstanding anything else in the Privacy Notice, we may disclose aggregate or non-personally identifying information about the users of our Site with third parties for marketing, advertising, research, or other business purposes.
We retain all information in-house except when required to disclose it to our business partners when necessary for lending and/or servicing purposes. Such partners include title and escrow companies and appraisal services.
Please Note: We do not share data obtained for the purposes of two-factor authentication.
How to limit sharing
When you apply for or obtain a mortgage loan from us, or the servicing of your loan is transferred to us, you have choices regarding the sharing of some personal information. Please see our Federal Privacy Notice for more information.
If you are a California resident, please also read our California Privacy Notice.
Retention of Personal Information
We retain information we collect as described in this Privacy Notice in accordance with applicable law to fulfill the purpose(s) for which it was collected, provide our services, resolve disputes, establish legal defenses, conduct audits, pursue legitimate business purposes, enforce our agreements, or to otherwise carry out our legal obligations.
Web Technologies
HELOC.com uses a variety of online tracking technologies to collect information when you visit or use our website or mobile application to improve your experience. These tools include:
Cookies - small text files that websites store on your computer. They are managed by your particular web browser and are typically used to store bits of text. Cookies help us to personalize your experience with our Site and improve your navigation within the Site by tailoring it to your individual preferences. Cookies help you save time if you visit the Site again. For example, if specific programs associated with our Site require a user ID and password, you have the option of requesting that we save that information so that you will not have to re-enter it the next time you access the Site. You can disallow cookies or prevent them from being set by making the appropriate selection from your browser options. However, if you set your browser options to disallow cookies, the functionality of our Site may be limited.
Web Beacons - (also known as pixels, tags or clear GIFs) A code snippet which is loaded when a user visits a website to gather data from or add functionality to a website. Beacons have diverse functions including third-party tracking, analytics, reporting, remarketing, conversion tracking, optimization, session replay, and on-page functionalities like live chat.
Embedded Web links when text is used as the link rather than the actual URL.
Session Replay — Helps us to better understand our users' needs and to optimize our service and the user experience. Session replay technology allows us to record and replay your navigation, clicks, scrolls, and keystrokes during your visit to our site. This tool collects mouse movements, clicks and scrolls; page navigation, duration of stay on pages; keystrokes (excluding sensitive information such as credit card details, passwords, and other personal data); form submissions (excluding sensitive fields which are automatically excluded from recording).
Website Usage
When you browse or visit our Site, we may collect information about your use of our Site through these technologies. This information could include your browser type and language, access times, and the address of the Site from which you arrived. We may also collect information about your Internet Protocol (IP) address, click stream behavior (e.g., the pages you view, the links you click, and other actions you take).
The information we collect may be used to analyze user behavior and trends; identify usability issues and areas for improvement; enhance the functionality and user-friendliness of our Site; evaluate the effectiveness of our content and features.
We may collect information about your online activities over time and across different Sites when you use our Site.
Online Behavioral Advertising
Third-party advertisers, including Google, may also use cookies to collect non-personally identifiable information from your browser, such as pages you visited, tools you have interacted with, the channel or method in which you arrived on our Site, etc., so that they can tailor the ads you see to your preferences and behaviors. Third-party cookies may also track the number of ad impressions, other uses of ad services, and interactions with these ads.
By continuing to browse on our Site, you are consenting to the use of cookies for personalization and advertising purposes. To learn more about this online advertising or to opt-out of this type of advertising, please click on the following links: http://optout.networkadvertising.org or https://optout.aboutads.info.
For the Mobile App, you can learn more about which third parties have currently enabled cookies for your mobile device and how to opt-out of some of those cookies by accessing the following website at http://www.networkadvertising.org/mobile-choices from your mobile device. On your mobile device you may also select "Limit Ad Tracking" (on iOS devices) or "Opt out of Interest-Based Ads" (on Android).
Disallowing Cookies
For instructions on disallowing cookies for the following web browsers, click the link with the name of your web browser below:
Google Chrome
Internet Explorer
Mozilla Firefox
Safari
For any other web browsers, please check what settings may be available to you for disallowing cookies.
Even if you disable tracking, keep in mind that you may still receive interest-based advertising, including from third parties with whom your information had been previously disclosed or advertising from third parties that is not based on your behavior, interests, and preferences.
The Site does not respond to browser "Do Not Track" signals.
Linking to other sites
The Site may contain links to third-party websites. HELOC.com disclaims liability for any information, materials, products or services posted or offered at any of the third-party websites linked on the site. By creating a link to a third-party website, HELOC.com does not endorse or recommend any products or services offered or information contained at the website, nor is HELOC.com liable for any failure of products or services offered or advertised at those websites. HELOC.com may remove any third-party link at any time. If you follow links to third-party sites not affiliated with HELOC.com, you should review their privacy and security policies and other terms and conditions, as they may be different from those of our Site and be less secure. If you decide to visit a third-party website via a link contained on HELOC.com's Site, you do so at your risk.
Customer Service
If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice, please contact us at 1-888-871-9916.