Finder’s Personal and Car Loan Awards methodology

The data and analysis Finder’s experts used to determine the best personal and car loans for each category of the 2024 Finder Product Awards.

What are the Finder Personal and Car Loan Awards?

Finder's Personal and Car Loan Awards recognise market-leading secured, unsecured and car loans, with a ratings methodology that compares features for 600 loans in our database.

Why you can trust our research

Document with pencil
275
personal loans assessed
Computer monitor and cellphone displaying charts
339
car loans assessed
Web browser displaying charts with magnifying glass
22,104
data points analysed

Selection criteria

Providers were included in the categories if their products were currently available, Finder had a full data set for the previous 12 months, and met the following criteria:

  • Personal Loans - Secured: Not a car loan, requires security and has a valid interest rate.
  • Personal Loans - Unsecured: Does not require security and has a valid interest rate.
  • Car Loans - New: Car loan available for new vehicles.
  • Car Loans - Used: Car loan available for used vehicles.
  • Car Loans - Electric Vehicles: Car loan specifically for "green" or "electric" purposes.

Scoring

Metrics scored using either the tiered scores when dealing with categorical data points or a dynamic scoring when dealing with numeric data. Finder's dynamic scoring means a product's metric is scored in comparison to the data points of all the other competitor products.

FeaturesScoring method
Interest rate
Dynamic scoring
Monthly service fee
Dynamic scoring
Application fee
Dynamic scoring

Weights

FeaturesUnsecuredSecuredNew carUsed carElectric car
Interest rate
70%
70%
80%
80%
80%
Monthly service fee
15%
15%
10%
10%
10%
Application fee
15%
15%
10%
10%
10%

Final award score

The final award score is calculated by first calculating a score for each of the previous 12 months. This evaluates each product against the competing products in those particular months. This score is calculated by multiplying the score for each metric by the weight percentage and summing the weighted scores:

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The final award score is calculated by taking a weighted average of the monthly scores with more recent months being weighted progressively more. This final award score is then ranked to determine the overall winners for each category.

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Ties

In the event of a tie between two loans, Finder uses profile-based scoring to decide a winner.

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