The New American ATM: Inside the HELOC Surge—and How Local Media Can Cash In

Read Time: 6 minutes

Across the country, home equity lines of credit—HELOCs—are staging a real comeback. And for local media sellers and ad agency professionals, this isn’t just a banking story. It’s a prospecting map.

This is a revenue category that is getting very noisy, very fast.

The Numbers: A Real HELOC Cycle, Not a Blip
Let’s start with the basics. Home equity lending—HELOCs plus closed-end home equity loans—rose about 7.2% year-over-year in 2024, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). Total outstanding home equity debt grew even faster, up just over 10%. Scotsman Guide+1

Lenders in Mortgage Bankers Association’s latest home equity study expect that momentum to accelerate, forecasting roughly 10% year-over-year growth in HELOC balances and 7% growth in home equity loans in 2025. My Mortgage Mindset
Curinos, a financial services and analytics company which tracks national home equity trends, goes further: they project a robust 14–17% jump in home equity originations in 2025 versus 2024, powered by an especially strong first half, and then a more measured 2–5% growth in 2026 as the market normalizes.

Federal Reserve data shows that balances on HELOCs have now risen for fourteen consecutive quarters, hitting about $422 billion outstanding by mid-2025.

And in early 2025, homeowners pulled nearly $25 billion from HELOCs in a single quarter—the highest first-quarter draw since 2008. MarketWatch

In other words: this isn’t a tiny niche product waking up. It’s a major loan category entering a new growth cycle.

A Short History: From ATM to Caution to Comeback
If you’ve been around long enough to remember the mid-2000s, this all sounds familiar.

During the housing boom, Americans treated their homes like ATMs. In 2005, homeowners extracted an estimated $750 billion of equity through cash-out refis and home-equity borrowing, much of it spent on consumption and debt payoff.

Then came the crash. HELOC balances peaked around $714 billion in 2009 and then shrank for a decade, dropping below $400 billion by 2019 as lenders tightened standards and households became more cautious.

Today’s resurgence sits in a different psychological place. Underwriting is tighter, FICO scores are higher, and loan-to-value ratios are far more conservative. According to one Urban Institute analysis, the long decline in HELOC debt after the crisis reflected not just bank risk aversion, but also “consumer cautiousness” about tapping their homes again.

Now that caution is evolving into something else: a kind of disciplined pragmatism.

Why HELOCs Are Growing Now
Several forces are converging to make HELOCs the product of the moment.

1. Record home equity, low leverage
Home equity in U.S. homes has nearly tripled since 2009 to roughly $35–36 trillion, by MBA and Federal Reserve estimates.
At the same time, average loan-to-value ratios are historically low—around the mid-20% range in some analyses—meaning many homeowners are “house-rich, payment-manageable.”

Marina Walsh of the MBA notes that with so much equity and so many borrowers sitting on cheap first mortgages, HELOCs and home equity loans have become the “product of choice” for a growing share of households.

2. Locked-in first mortgages
The defining feature of this cycle is the lock-in effect. Millions of households refinanced into 2–4% first mortgages during the pandemic and now face 6–7% rates in the purchase market. Moving would mean giving up a once-in-a-lifetime rate—and then paying more for a smaller or not-much-better house.

So homeowners are staying put and renovating. Analysts at Goldman Sachs and others expect renovation spending to remain strong into 2025 and beyond precisely because people are locked into low mortgage rates but sitting on record equity. Investopedia+1

3. Rates that are high—but falling
Yes, HELOC rates today are still in the 8% range on average, but that needs context. Credit-card APRs are north of 20%, and personal loans hover around 12–13%.

Bankrate’s analysts expect both HELOC and home equity loan rates to drift lower through 2025 as the Fed continues easing, noting that a “declining interest rate environment will provide some relief for borrowers.”

Another Bankrate forecast suggests that if HELOC rates fall into the low-6% range by late 2026, the monthly payment on a $50,000 draw could drop by roughly 17% compared with today.

MidFlorida Credit Union a large Florida credit union analysis similarly sees HELOCs settling in the 6–7% band by 2026–27—still above pandemic lows but comfortably below today’s pricing.

4. The pivot from renovations to debt consolidation
Home improvements are still the number-one use of home equity borrowing, but the story is shifting. MBA data shows that in 2024, about 46% of borrowers used home equity for renovations—down from 65% in 2022—while the share using it for debt consolidation jumped from 25% to 39% over two years.

One MarketWatch analysis estimates that Americans tapped nearly $25 billion via HELOCs in early 2025, much of it to move 20%-plus credit-card debt into single-digit home-equity rates.

In plain language: HELOCs have become the middle class’s main tool for cleaning up expensive debt and funding necessary upgrades without detonating their monthly budget.

Who’s Winning: Banks, Credit Unions, and the Fintech Wildcard
The players in this resurgence are shifting.

American Banker reports that banks now hold just under two-thirds of HELOC balances, down from more than 80% about fifteen years ago, as fintechs and nonbanks have rushed into the space.

Wall Street analyst Meredith Whitney argues that banks, still scarred by the mortgage crisis, risk missing a fresh HELOC wave unless they reenter with modern, digital-first offerings.

Meanwhile, platforms like Figure have facilitated billions in HELOCs, accounting for a notable share of 2024 growth, and their executives bluntly say “there is a lot of demand that the banks aren’t meeting.”

Yet this isn’t a subprime replay. A New York Fed researcher notes that today’s HELOC borrowers look more like prime switchers: people trading costlier debt for cheaper, collateral-backed credit. The Fed describes it less as a borrowing binge and more as a “product switch” toward lower-rate options.

Credit unions and community banks sit in a particularly sweet spot. They combine strong local brands with homeowner-heavy customer bases—and they are under intense pressure to grow lending without touching long-term fixed-rate mortgages at today’s yields.

That’s the opening for local media.

Why Local Media Is Uniquely Positioned
HELOCs are not a national-only story. Home equity is hyperlocal: shaped by neighborhood prices, local insurance costs, property taxes, and the aging housing stock in each market.

Local media—radio, TV, newspapers, city magazines, outdoor, digital news sites—are where that local housing story gets told every day:

• The morning TV coverage of storm damage and insurance hikes
• The radio show about property taxes and reassessments
• The local site tracking which neighborhoods are “up and coming”

For banks and credit unions trying to reach homeowners who actually can qualify for a HELOC, that context is gold.

Local media has three structural advantages here:

1. Trust. Home equity is an anxious topic. People are literally betting their house. Local news brands, legacy radio voices, and community newspapers still carry disproportionate trust compared with anonymous digital banners.
2. Targetability. Even tradtional media can be data-smart now—using ZIP code targeting, homeowner overlays, and first-party audience data to reach equity-rich households.
3. Storytelling. HELOC marketing isn’t just about rate. It’s about the why: debt relief, a safer roof, an accessible bathroom for aging parents. Local media are built to tell human stories, not just blast offers.

How Local Media Should Pursue Banks and Credit Unions
So what do you do with all this if you’re a local media AE or an ad agency strategist?

Here are some practical moves.
1. Map the HELOC battlefield in your DMA
Before you pitch, understand the lay of the land:

• Who are the top HELOC originators locally—big banks, regionals, credit unions, fintech partners?
• Which institutions already advertise with you (or your competitors)?
• Which ones are publicly talking about home equity growth in their earnings, blogs, or branch promotions?

Bring a simple one-page “HELOC Landscape” into your next bank call: local equity stats, recent home-equity growth data, and a ranked list of competitors’ share of voice in your market.

2. Lead with the homeowner story, not just “we have reach”
Banks are already drowning in pitch decks promising “scale” and “targeted impressions.”

Differentiate by telling a homeowner-centric story:

• “In our market, homeowners gained roughly X in equity over the past Y years.”
• “Most are locked into sub-4% mortgages, so they’re renovating and consolidating, not moving.”

Then connect that story to your specific audiences: morning news viewers, commuters, homeowners reading weekend inserts, visitors to your home-improvement microsite, or listeners to your financial advice podcast.

3. Package HELOCs around use cases
Remember that borrowers are thinking in verbs, not in financial acronyms.

Build campaigns around the three big reasons people tap equity today:

1. “Don’t move. Improve.” Kitchen, roof, HVAC, aging-in-place upgrades.
2. “Trade 20% APR for single digits.” Debt consolidation from credit cards to HELOC.
3. “Life events without life-wrecking debt.” College tuition gaps, medical expenses, business capital.

For each use case, suggest:

• A testimonial-style radio or podcast execution
• Explainer content in print/digital: “When does a HELOC make sense?”
• Short social video or OTT spots showing a real family scenario (with compliance-friendly disclaimers, of course)

Banks and credit unions are under real regulatory scrutiny. Position your outlet as the partner that tells balanced, educational stories rather than hype.

4. Pair legacy media with performance
This isn’t 1998. Your HELOC package should blend:

• Brand and trust: radio, TV, print, premium digital
• Intent and performance: search, social, retargeting, lead-gen landing pages, newsletter sponsorships

You want your client to own the moment when a homeowner hears a storm-damage story on your 6 p.m. newscast and later types “HELOC vs home equity loan” into Google.

Your pitch: “We’ll be there when the idea is planted, and when the decision is made.”

5. Sell the competitive urgency
Curinos’ forecast of mid-teens originations growth in 2025, followed by steady gains in 2026, implies a land grab that’s happening now, not in three years.

Use that. Show banks and credit unions that:

• Fintech players are already gaining double-digit shares of HELOC growth.
• Consumers are shifting from high-cost card debt into home equity products—and whoever educates them first will likely keep them.

You’re not just selling impressions. You’re selling category position in what could be a decade-long re-normalization of home-equity borrowing.

The Deeper Psychology: What HELOCs Tell Us About 2020s America
In the early 2000s, tapping home equity felt like a high-flying bet on ever-rising home prices.
In the mid-2020s, it feels more like triage and careful reinvestment.

You see it in the numbers: lower loan-to-value ratios, higher FICOs, more borrowers using HELOCs to swap 20% card debt for single-digit rates, or to repair a 40-year-old roof on a 40-year-old house. American Banker+3Investopedia+3Financial Times+3
You also see it in the cultural script. Americans no longer think of home equity as a pure windfall. It’s more like a pressure valve—something you open carefully when life, inflation, or tuition bills get too tight.

Meredith Whitney points out that consumers today are far less leveraged than they were before the financial crisis, even as home equity has soared.

That combination—high assets, relatively conservative borrowing—captures the mood of this decade: cautious optimism with a side of chronic anxiety.

For local media and advertisers, the job is not just to move product. It’s to speak into that anxiety with clarity and respect. To explain, not just promote. To acknowledge the risks while illuminating the options.

If you can do that—if your campaigns help a homeowner feel a little less confused, a little more in control—you won’t just win HELOC dollars in 2025 and 2026.

You’ll earn something rarer in this crowded, mistrustful media environment: the sense that your brand is sitting at that kitchen table with them, not just sending mail to their mailbox.

And that’s the kind of equity no algorithm can easily replace.