| Rocket Mortgage, LLC | |
| Former Names: | Rock Financial (1985–1999) Quicken Loans, LLC (1999–2021) |
| Type: | Subsidiary |
| Founded: | (as Rock Financial) |
| Location: | One Campus Martius |
| Location City: | Detroit, Michigan |
| Location Country: | U.S. |
| Key People: | Varun Krishna(CEO), Bill Emerson (COO), Bob Walters (COO) |
| Brands: | Rocket Mortgage |
| Parent: | Rocket Companies Inc. |
| Revenue: | (2020) |
| Operating Income: | US$9.532 billion (2020) |
| Net Income: | US$932 million (2020) |
| Assets: | US$37.535 billion (2020) |
| Equity: | US$7.882 billion (2020) |
| Owner: | Dan Gilbert (93.2%) |
| Num Employees: | 14,700 (2024) [1] |
| Footnotes: | [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] |
Rocket Mortgage, LLC, formerly Quicken Loans, LLC, is an American mortgage lender, headquartered in Detroit, Michigan. In January 2018, Rocket Mortgage became the largest overall retail lender in the U.S., and it was also the largest online retail mortgage lender.[7] Rocket Mortgage relies on wholesale funding to make its loans and uses online applications rather than a branch system.[8] Amrock is also part of the Rocket Mortgage Family of Companies.[9] The company closed more than $400 billion of mortgage volume across all 50 states from 2013 through 2017.[10]
Rock Financial was founded as a mortgage broker in 1985 by Dan Gilbert, Ron Berman, Lindsay Gross, and Gary Gilbert.[11] [12] The company became a mortgage lender in 1988, and in May 1998, Gilbert took Rock Financial public, launching an IPO underwritten by Bear Stearns.
The company started to change course in the late 1990s, shifting from a traditional mortgage provider to an online-focused lender. Traditionally, the home mortgage business in America has been fragmented due to varying regulations in each state and locality. Gilbert challenged this orthodoxy, however, by offering loan applications online that were reviewed by experts versed in the regulations of each region but who were located in a central headquarters.
In October 1999, almost a year and a half after Rock Financial’s 1998 IPO, Intuit Inc. agreed to buy the company at a valuation of $370 million.[13] The name changed to Quicken Loans. In 2002, Dan Gilbert and a group of private investors bought the company back.[14]
In 2004, Quicken Loans became a defendant in a class action lawsuit. This was filed against the company on behalf of employees who had worked as loan consultants and wanted overtime pay. In 2011, a jury ruled in favor of Quicken, ruling that the positions were exempt from overtime and also that the employees worked “zero hours over 40.”[15]
In August 2007, the entire mortgage industry faced a crisis in obtaining new credit from banking institutions and hedge funds. In response, Quicken Loans discontinued second mortgages, home equity lines of credit, Alt-A products, and deferred interest loans.[16]
On November 12, 2007, Founder and Chairman, Dan Gilbert announced a development agreement with the city of Detroit to move the company headquarters downtown, consolidating suburban offices.[17] The construction sites reserved for development by the agreement included the location of the former Statler Hotel on Grand Circus Park and the former Hudson's location.
The company saw a small drop in employment levels following the 2008 financial crisis.[18] [19]
Quicken Loans moved into its downtown Detroit headquarters in August 2010.[20] The initial move brought 1,700 employees to the city.
In 2009, Quicken was headquartered at One Campus Martius facing Campus Martius Park in Detroit. The company also housed its employees in Downtown Detroit's First National Building, The Qube, Chrysler House, One Woodward Avenue, and 1001 Woodward, all owned by Quicken Loans' parent company, Rock Ventures.[21]
In 2014, Quicken Loans grew to be the 2nd largest mortgage lender in the United States, and was the nation's largest online mortgage lender.[22] In 2016, the company employed 24,000 people nationwide, with approximately 17,000 working in the city of Detroit by 2017, making it Detroit's largest employer, minority employer, and taxpayer.[23] [24]
In January 2018, Quicken Loans became the nation's largest mortgage lender.[25]
On October 15, 2018 Quicken Loans announced that it was expanding into Canada by opening a tech center in downtown Windsor, Ontario.[26] [27] [28]
On July 7, 2020, Quicken Loans filed paperwork with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to start the process of taking the company public under the name Rocket Companies.[29]
On August 6, 2020, Rocket Companies, Inc. went public on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol RKT,[30] raising $1.8 billion.[31] [32] At the end of 2020, Rocket Companies originated over 1.1 million loans valued at $313 billion,[33] at that time these figures were almost twice that of the next largest lender in the U.S., United Wholesale Mortgage, which is also headquartered near Detroit.
In January 2021, Quicken Loans launched a new national mortgage broker directory on RocketMortgage.com.[34] This was part of the company’s effort to help brokers grow their businesses and provide more options for home buyers.
In March, the company was the number one mortgage lender by overall business in the United States.
On May 12, 2021 Quicken Loans announced that it would be rebranded to Rocket Mortgage, by July 31, 2021.[35] <
In 2015, Quicken Loans created Rocket Mortgage, the first lender to perform electronic closings (eClosings) in all 50 states.[36] When the platform was launched, TechCrunch claimed it was the mortgage industry's “iPhone moment” and compared the application process to TurboTax.[37] The Rocket Mortgage platform uses data input by customers to pull information such as property taxes, homeowner’s insurance, and income history.[38] With this system, customers no longer have to manually upload documents. Once the platform has all needed data, it suggests customizable loan options.
Rocket owns three patents around verifying client data, filtering it and sourcing it, and extracting it from external parties.[39] In its first full year, the Rocket Mortgage platform funded $7 billion in closed loans.[40]
In 2018, Rocket Companies surpassed Wells Fargo as the number one mortgage lender in the United States.[41]
In 2019, Rocket Mortgage filed another patent for data set selection using multi-source constraints.[42] In October of 2020, a patent was filed regarding extracting data sets from external data stores.[43]
J.D. Power named Rocket Mortgage number one in the nation for client satisfaction in primary mortgage origination in 2020, the 11th consecutive year either Rocket Mortgage or Quicken Loans earned the recognition.[44] That year the company doubled its mortgage originations.[45]
As of 2021, Rocket subsidiary Amrock has fulfilled more than 1 million digital mortgage closings.[46] [47] While Rocket Mortgage, during the year 2021,[48] grew its mortgage originations by more than 30%, continuing to surpass Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase.
Rocket sponsors the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse, an arena located in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. It is the home of the Cleveland Cavaliers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the Cleveland Monsters of the American Hockey League.[49] The arena, formerly known as the Quicken Loans Arena, changed its name to the Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse after the completion of the arena's renovation and expansion in 2019.[50]
In 2022, Rocket Mortgage and Q2 announced a new partnership to support homebuyers. Under the partnership, banks and credit unions can offer customers digital access to Rocket Mortgage - integrated on the Q2 digital banking platform - and Rocket Mortgage then takes over all actions related to loans and servicing. The new digital offering simplifies the mortgage process and is offered at no cost to the financial institution.
At the end of 2022, Rocket Mortgage originated 464,363 mortgages worth $127.6 billion. United Wholesale Mortgage, the second largest mortgage company, originated 348,415 mortgages worth $127.5 billion.[51]
Rocket Mortgage has launched several initiatives that support its home communities of Detroit, Cleveland, Charlotte, and Phoenix, including initiatives focused on ending veteran homelessness[52] and supporting digital literacy.[53] [54]