Comerica Bank: 2024 Home Equity Review

Benefits

• Comerica offers a low introductory rate for six months: 6.99% APRs, as of this writing. This promotional rate includes a 0.25 percent discount for maintaining an automatic payment from a Comerica Bank deposit account.After that, variable APRs can be as low as 9.0% – 9.75%, about in the middle of Bankrate’s average rate range for HELOCs.
• Comerica charges no title fees and no cost for the initial property valuation for credit line amounts up to $500,000.

Drawbacks

• Comerica HELOCs are available in only five states – Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan and Texas (but those states include a third of the U.S. population).
• If you repay your line of credit within two years, you’ll be subject to also repaying the closing costs the bank covered on your behalf.

Home equity loan products offered

Comerica offers only a home equity line of credit (HELOC).

The bank’s HELOC is a variable-rate line of credit in amounts of $10,000 to $500,000 over a 30-year term. Borrowers can draw from the account during the first 10 years, taking the remaining 20 years for repayment.

Types of fees charged

There’s a $50 annual fee, although it’s waived for the first year. For HELOCs closed within two years, Comerica imposes an early termination fee of 2 percent of the credit limit with a maximum fee of $350. Comerica collects no title fees and no cost for the initial property valuation conducted for credit line amounts up to $500,000. Additional property valuations, when requested by the borrower, are paid by the borrower. If you close your loan in Florida, you will be responsible for reimbursement of Florida documentation stamp fees, which will be paid on your behalf if you keep the HELOC open for longer than 24 months.

How to qualify for a HELOC with Comerica Bank

Whether you qualify for a Comerica Bank HELOC depends on a few factors: your credit score, combined loan-to-value (CLTV) ratio, existing debt and the collateral used to secure the loan.

The bank limits the CLTV ratio to 80 percent for a HELOC.

How to apply with Comerica Bank

When you’re ready to apply for a Comerica Bank home equity product, you can do so in a few ways: online, over the phone (AZ/CA/TX: 800-589-1400; MI/FL: 800-292-1300 ) or at a branch.

How Bankrate scored Comerica Bank

• Methodology

  To determine a home equity lender's Bankrate Score, Bankrate rates lenders on a scale of one (1) to five (5) stars — with five (5) the highest rating — based on a variety of factors relating to the lender's products and services. To assign our ratings, we assessed each mortgage lender across three core areas:

  • Affordability: Annual percentage rate (APR) - 80%; introductory APR - 20%
  • Availability: Licensing - 50%; credit score - 20%; loan minimum - 10%; draw requirement - 10%; loan products - 10% 
  • Borrower experience: Rate transparency - 45%; convenience - 35%; customer service - 10%; fixed-rate options - 10%

  Learn more about our methodology.