Things are getting more interesting in the mortgage world, at least when it comes to earning rewards.
One of the nation’s largest mortgage lenders, Fairway Home Mortgage, has launched a credit card.
Known as the “Made for Home Card,” it rewards cardholders for simply making their mortgage payment on time each month.
In addition, you can earn bonus points in a variety of home-centric categories that can eventually be redeemed for mortgage-related costs.
The new card will initially be marketed through select Fairway Home Mortgage loan officers, and will get a nationwide launch in January 2026.
Made for Home Card Highlights
- Earn 1X points for simply paying your mortgage each month
- 3X points on gas, EV charging, groceries and utilities
- 2X points on home improvement, furniture, and home maintenance
- 1X point on all other purchases throughout the month
- Points can be redeemed toward closing costs or mortgage rate buydowns
- No annual fee
How You Earn Points for Paying the Mortgage Each Month
While it might sound like you can use the credit card to make your mortgage payment, that’s not how it works.
Instead, you pay your mortgage the same way you always did, but earn one point per dollar of the payment each month.
Once you get approved for the card, you need to connect the bank account you use to pay your mortgage to the Fairway/Made Card app via Plaid.
Plaid is a tech company that allows you to connect bank accounts and other financials to specific apps.
Connecting the accounts allows them to track your payments and reward you in the process.
Apparently it’s just a few clicks, and once connected, you’ll automatically earn bonus points on your mortgage payments going forward.
This is similar to other programs that have been announced, including Mesa Mortgage an Bilt Card 2.0.
Both will let you earn points for on-time mortgage payments, but you must still pay with a bank account or other acceptable form of payment.
How Many Points Can You Earn for Paying the Mortgage?
Now let’s see if this is worth it. After all, there are plenty of other credit cards out there vying for your spend each month.
This new Made for Home Card earns 1X on mortgage payments, which seems to be the industry-standard now that we’ve got a few players in the nascent space.
The cool thing is it includes the full principal, interest, taxes, and insurance (PITI), and even HOA dues, yet another argument to go with impounds on your mortgage.
For example, if your monthly housing payment is $2,500 per month, you’ll get 2,500 points each month.
Over a 12-month period, that’s 60,000 points, which is a decent haul to earn on a recurring basis.
And since you typically don’t earn anything making mortgage payments from a bank account, there’s no real opportunity cost.
However, other options like Mesa and Bilt require you to make other non-mortgage transactions during the month to earn the points on the mortgage.
Not sure if that’ll be the case here, but time will tell. I couldn’t find anything in the fine print.
Fortunately, on top of the points you can earn for mortgage, the card earns 3X points on gas, EV charging, groceries, and utilities.
And 2X points on home improvement, furniture, and maintenance, and 1X point on all other purchases.
So there’s a lot of opportunity to earn a lot of points beyond just the mortgage.
The biggie though, at least for me, is how you can redeem. Points are only as good as what they can be used for.
In terms of redemptions, you can use your points towards your next Fairway Home Mortgage loan.
That includes options to lower your closing costs and/or buy down your rate via mortgage discount points.
Or you can redeem for standard stuff like statement credits, gift cards, etc.
Personally, I would want travel partner redemptions, such as airlines and hotels, since those are always the most lucrative.
Why Is Fairway Home Mortgage Offering a Credit Card Anyway?
As for why Fairway Home Mortgage decided to launch a co-branded credit card, it’s all about customer retention.
Mortgage lenders have wised up in the past couple years, realizing to stay relevant they need to reach a little further into the customer’s world.
This is why UWM has invested in Bilt, and why Rocket acquired Redfin. It’s not enough to just be a mortgage company anymore.
You don’t want the homeowner to use you once and forget about you. This new credit card gives the customer a call to action to use Fairway again for a subsequent home purchase or mortgage refinance.
After all, if they can redeem points to reduce closing costs or get a lower mortgage rate, they might be more apt to use Fairway over other options.
But if you’re the customer, make sure it’s actually in your best interest to do so.
Discounts and perks are nice, but you’ve got to do the math and compare alternatives (after factoring in the rewards points) to ensure you don’t miss out on something better.
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