Published on May 21, 2025
Lenders and mortgage industry watchers say a simple change to allow competition in credit scoring for U.S. mortgages could help more people get real estate loans, but government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac (FMCC) are dragging their feet.
Veterans Affairs and some Federal Home Loan Banks last year started accepting loans scored by VantageScore, a company formed by the three largest credit bureaus. The GSEs made the change in order to use a new scoring system that can consider more potential borrowers by taking rental payments and other credit trend data into account. In contrast, Fannie and Freddie—which back more than two-thirds of U.S. mortgages—require mortgage loans to be scored using Fair Isaac Corporation (FICO) systems, some of which haven’t been updated in two decades.
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