The number of online visitors to Australia's leading mortgage comparison website www.yourmortgage.com.au surged by 14.49% in October, suggesting buyers are actively shopping for the best mortgage rates as interest rates are expected to rise even higher.

Some 80,728 people visited the site in October, up from its September figure of 70,513. The visitors came from 2,930 cities around the world although the majority came from Australian capitals. Sydneysiders accounted for nearly one-third of visitors with 27,472 while the 18,166 visitors from Melbourne made up 22.5%.

Perth accounted for 6,616 or 8.20% while 3,376 or 4.18% came from Adelaide. Londoners were the most well-represented overseas visitors at 891 or 1.10%.

Mortgage firm Aussie Home Loans has also revealed that it now draws over 75% of its business through its website, up from just 2% in 2003.

"Consumer behaviour was changing and the way customers were wanting to interact with our products and our brand has changed significantly. So much so that our marketing techniques were not going to work in that environment," said the firm's marketing and product general manager, Stuart Tucker.

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