Getting a mortgage used to mean visiting banks one by one and hoping the first offer was fair. LendingTree flipped that. A borrower filled out one form, and lenders bid for the loan. When the company filed to go public in early 2000, shopping for lenders from a kitchen table was a new idea. Its slogan said it plainly: when banks compete, you win.

A Banking Town Upstart

Doug Lebda founded the company in 1996 in Charlotte, a banking city. His bet was that the internet could flip the loan process. Instead of borrowers chasing banks, lenders would compete for borrowers. LendingTree did not lend money itself. It earned fees from lenders for qualified requests. That let it grow without holding any loans on its own balance sheet.

IAC and Back Again

LendingTree priced at $12 a share in February 2000. It grew through the housing boom, and in 2003 IAC bought the company. In 2008, in the middle of the financial crisis, IAC spun it back out as a separate public company, and Lebda returned to lead it. The business grew from mortgages into credit cards, personal loans and insurance. It still trades on Nasdaq under its original ticker, TREE.

Cover: The Apple Tree, Willem Witsen. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for an apple tree (the lending tree).