Your Home Loan Toolkit

Federally-mandated booklet to guide consumers through the process of shopping for a mortgage and buying a house

The toolkit provides a step-by-step guide to help consumers understand the nature and costs of real estate settlement services, define what affordable means to them, and find their best mortgage. The toolkit features interactive worksheets and checklists, conversation starters for discussions between consumers and lenders, and research tips to help consumers seek out and find important information. The booklet was produced in a large and small print size, a 508-compliant PDF and in Spanish.

The Center for Plain Language specifically called out Your Home Loan Toolkit in it's 2015 Federal Plain Language Report Card: "It combines good document design for an instructional document with clear prose, tables, textboxes, easy-to-use forms, with engaging but not distracting colors."

Read more about the design and usability testing of the booklet in my article on CFPB Open Tech.