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LendingTree

LendingTree, Inc. is an online lending marketplace, founded in 1996 and headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. The business platform allows potential borrowers to connect with multiple loan operators to find optimal terms for loans, credit cards, deposit accounts, insurance, etc. LendingTree allows borrowers to shop and compare competitive rates and terms across an array of financial products. Other additional services include financing tools, comparative loan searches and borrowing information.[3]

History

Founding

After graduating from Bucknell University, Doug Lebda went to work for PricewaterhouseCoopers in Pittsburgh as an auditor and consultant. During the process of purchasing his first home via a mortgage, he found the process of comparing numerous resources time-consuming. Lebda sought a better way to improve this process in the marketplace. Lebda subsequently started CreditSource USA in late 1996; a year later the new company was rebranded as LendingTree. In 1998, LendingTree was launched online.[4][5]

IAC ownership

LendingTree went through an initial public offering (IPO) on February 15, 2000.[6] In May 2003, LendingTree was acquired by IAC/InterActiveCorp, former owner of Ticketmaster, Home Shopping Network and Match.com. In 2004, LendingTree acquired HomeLoanCenter.com and formed LendingTree Loans.[7] After five years, LendingTree spun off from IAC to join newly established Tree.com, Inc. Tree.com was the parent company of several brands and businesses in the financial services and real estate industries including LendingTree.com; GetSmart.com; DegreeTree.com; LendingTreeAutos.com; and DoneRight.com.[8]

In 2015, LendingTree disassembled the Tree.com umbrella to focus on its core brand, LendingTree, which incorporated business loans, personal loans, debt consolidation, free credit scores, and student loans along with its core mortgage products home loans, mortgage refinance, and home equity.[9]

Since 2019, LendingTree has served as the official name sponsor of the annual college football bowl played in Mobile, Alabama, the LendingTree Bowl.

On October 13, 2025, LendingTree announced that founder and CEO Doug Lebda died the previous day in an all-terrain vehicle collision.[10] The company named COO Scott Peyree as the new CEO, and Steve Ozonian as chairman of the board.[11]

Acquisitions

In 2009, LendingTree acquired the personal financial management website Thrive.[12] In August 2016, it acquired SimpleTuition, a company focused on student loans.[13] Subsequent acquisitions include CompareCards (2016),[14] DepositAccounts.com (2017),[15] MagnifyMoney (2017),[16] SnapCap (2017),[17] Student Loan Hero (2018),[18] QuoteWizard (2018),[19] and ValuePenguin (2018).[20]

2024 data breach

In 2024, the Lending Tree platform QuoteWizard suffered a data breach and extortion attempt as part of the 2024 Snowflake mass hacking campaign. The stolen data included personally identifiable information (PII) of nearly 50 million customers. It also included partial customer driver's license numbers, driving histories, risk profiles, and auto information such as auto make/model and VIN numbers [21]

See also

External links

References

  1. Lending Tree, Inc 2024 10K filing U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, March 7, 2025^
  2. Lending Tree, Inc Sec.gov, retrieved October 18, 2016^
  3. LendingTree Reinvents How Borrowers Shop For Money with its New My LendingTree Experience Finance.yahoo.com^
  4. Steve Goldberg. LendingTree: An original dot-com darling grows up CNBC, 2014-08-03, retrieved 2018-05-01^
  5. Shawn Tully. LendingTree Is Booming, and Its Stock Soaring, As More Borrowers Shop Online Fortune.com, retrieved October 13, 2025^
  6. LendingTree, Inc. Sec.gov, retrieved 2020-10-22^
  7. Alaine Sherter. Mortgage Entrepreneur Anthony Hsieh Says He's No Predator and Plans to Prove It CBS News, 2010-01-07, retrieved 2019-01-22^
  8. Our Roots - Timeline LendingTree.com^
  9. Tree.com, Inc. Changes Corporate Name to LendingTree, Inc. Prnewswire.com^
  10. Nicholas G. Miller. LendingTree CEO Dies in Accident The Wall Street Journal, 2025-10-13, retrieved 2025-10-13^
  11. LendingTree CEO and founder Doug Lebda dies in ATV accident Apnews.com, Oct 13, 2025, retrieved October 13, 2025^
  12. Wauters, R. (2009). "Tree.com Acquires Mint Competitor Thrive" TechCrunch^
  13. Francis Monfort. LendingTree acquires certain assets of SimpleTuition S&P Global, August 1, 2016, retrieved March 3, 2022^
  14. LendingTree Acquires CompareCards PR Newswire, November 16, 2016, retrieved March 3, 2022^
  15. Michael Seale. Birmingham company acquired by financial giant in $33M deal Birmingham Business Journal, June 16, 2017, retrieved March 3, 2022^
  16. Jingnan Huo. LendingTree acquires comparison shopping site MagnifyMoney American Banker, June 21, 2017, retrieved March 3, 2022^
  17. Thad Moore. Charleston startup SnapCap acquired by LendingTree in deal worth up to $21 million The Post and Courier, September 19, 2017, retrieved March 3, 2022^
  18. LendingTree, Inc. Announces Agreement to Acquire Student Loan Hero Markets.businessinsider.com, retrieved 13 July 2018^
  19. LendingTree (TREE) Acquires QuoteWizard.com for $370.2M Finance.yahoo.com^
  20. LendingTree (TREE) to Acquire ValuePenguin.com for $105M Zacks.com, retrieved 2018-12-27^
  21. Matt Burgess. The Snowflake Attack May Be Turning Into One of the Largest Data Breaches Ever Wired, retrieved 2025-01-05^