Plug into the world of home mortgages, loans, and lenders on the Internet.

When it comes to researching mortgage options, the Internet offers 24-hour convenience. While most customers still prefer to complete their loan transaction with a "live" mortgage broker or lender, there's a lot of valuable information online.

Here, we explore the benefits and alert you to the potential pitfalls of shopping for your mortgage online. Mortgage websites come in two basic flavors: those sites that don't offer loans (called "no-loan" sites) and those that do.

Mortgage Information ("No-Loan") Sites

No-loan sites don't broker or lend mortgage money, but typically provide mortgage content, information, and news, as well as mortgage rates -- just what most mortgage shoppers want and need.

Sites like HSH Homeplans (http://www.hsh.com) and Bank Rate Monitor (http://www.bankrate.com) keep daily tabs on mortgage rates, indexes, and market events that push costs up or down. Visit sites like these to obtain the latest regional average rates on purchase, refinance, equity, and other mortgages.

Also explore these sites' libraries of mortgage information: You can examine mortgage programs, learn mortgage lingo, understand underwriting, get answers about the loan qualification process, crunch numbers with online mortgage calculators, and more.

No-loan sites are also referred to as "referral" sites because they introduce you to a host of participating lenders, either through advertisements or links embedded in the content. The referrals could be useful, provided you gather enough of them to adequately compare loan costs. That's a tedious process -- and advertised rates are often based on a best-case scenario, and can change overnight.

Still within the no-loan site category, don't overlook informative government, quasi-government, and trade sites, including Fannie Mae (http://www.fanniemae.com), Freddie Mac (http://www.freddiemac.com), the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (http://www.hud.gov), and Mortgage Bankers Association of America (http://www.mbaa.org). These offer information about the latest mortgage programs, conforming loan amount changes, and general consumer and industry information.

Mortgage Money Sites

Online mortgage loan sites that offer direct access to loans come in three basic varieties: direct or single lenders, auction sites, and multilender shopping sites.

Direct or single lender sites. Most mortgage websites are direct lender sites. These include mortgage lenders such as Countrywide (http://www.countrywide.com) as well as all-purpose banks that make mortgage loans, like Wells Fargo (http://www.wellsfargo.com) and Bank of America (http://www.bankofamerica.com).

If, for whatever reason, you've already decided to borrow from a particular lender, you might start with a visit to its website. You'll soon realize, however, that these lenders rarely provide complete product information (points, fees, lock periods, and the like) online. For that, you'll need to call or visit the lender.

Auction sites. Some mortgage sites allow you to complete a loan application, which is then sent to lenders who, in turn, compete for your business. Some of the lenders are sub-prime lenders, making these sites a possible choice for you if your credit is damaged. You won't get immediate feedback, but must wait a day or so for several offers. To compare more loans, you'll have to repeat the process on each site. Auction sites include LendingTree.com, GetSmart.com, and RealEstate.com.

Multilender shopping sites. With multilender shopping sites, you need not complete an application before you shop for a mortgage. Examples of such sites include http://www.loanshop.com and http://www.eloan.com. You enter the loan amount, property details, and other information, and you'll get current rates, APR, points, even settlement costs for each loan from dozens of lenders. You can sort loans by each factor. You can also put loans side by side and make apples-to-apples comparisons of interest rate adjustments, margins, life caps, year-by-year payment totals, and interest costs and tax benefits.

If you choose to complete an application, mortgage shopping sites review your application, process the required documentation, and ship your loan to the lender for further review and underwriting. Be warned, however -- many consumers report dissatisfaction with multilender sites, saying that they get second class treatment from the lender.