Money doesn't actually talk. We do.

All The Cool Kids Have Home-Equity Loans

Have you ever noticed those beautiful, acne-free faces staring back at you when you browse a bank’s web pages?

These are often stock photos—existing photographs supplied by a stock photography agency that can be licensed by advertisers and publishers. The images are typically of good-looking, stylish people with blindingly white teeth and satisfied grins, often leaping into the air at the sheer excitement of a decent home-equity loan. The message here is that the people using the bank are not your old-fart parents but the cool kids who are just like you—or who you wish or think you are like.

Here’s a thought though: How about products speaking for themselves? We all like to look at a pretty face. But, when we’re shopping around for a new checking account or a loan, we are much more turned on by terrific money-saving deals than we are by the youth and hipness level of a bank’s customer base.

It would be nice if these banks put as much effort into clear, detailed explanations of their products and easily reachable customer service as they do into plastering their sites with beautiful faces. I don’t care if Iggy Pop or Dick Cheney is pitching me a student loan as long as I get a reasonable interest rate and a waived origination fee.

Here’s what popped into our heads when we saw these smiling, attractive people pitching everything from mortgages to CDs and credit cards:

Chase home-equity loan calculators bring the kind of fire to our relationship that we’ve been waiting for.

More silliness after the break…

I typically manage my Capital One account while sitting indian-style on the hood of my car. Translation: Capital One customers are young, carefree, quirky people.

Shaggy hair + Guitar + Converses = Wachovia fixed-rate mortgages are as hip as your grandmother.

I forgot if I was posing for anti-depressants, a college brochure or Citibank. But whatever, this pose will do.

This rad HSBC student checking account allows our parents to put money in our accounts, which helps us pay for the illicit substance that currently has us laughing for no reason.

HSBC: Helping one hipster at a time.

–Irina Aleksander