Tag Archives: Credit Score

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac recently made headlines when congress members said that the GSEs had a monopoly on their credit scoring system due to their singular use of the FICO score.

As of now, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac only consider the FICO credit scoring model when making mortgage purchase decisions.

The tightened credit box routinely blamed for curtailing a full-blown housing recovery turned a corner in the second half of 2015, with Quicken Loans reporting originations to borrowers with credit scores as low as 580.

Mortgage originations in the housing market rose significantly over the last year thanks to the positive overall credit picture in the U.S., along with a rise in the ...

As recovery continues across the nation from the mortgage crisis in 2007, some states appear to be patching things together more quickly than others.

TransUnion recently released their National Consumer Survey revealing that as Americans enter into the peak time of the year to buy a home, three out of four of people are aware that their credit score is important, yet they are not sure about how it will affect them when purchasing a home. The survey found that the majority of those who intend to or are considering buying a home in the next 12 to 18 months are not aware of actions that could enhance their credit and are unsure of how their credit directly affects the home financing process.

More than half of those surveyed were not aware that overdue bills could impact their credit score, and only 37 percent said they were confident that their current score could help them accomplish their personal goals. Sixty-six percent said they would like to improve their credit score over the next year.

Before the recession about 15 percent of Americans had a FICO score less than 600, while after the recession about 25 percent of Americans had the same low score, according to a study released in 2010 by Deutsche Bank. More recently, the Urban Institute and Encore Capital Group's Consumer Credit Research Institute found that one-third of consumers with credit files had debt in collection. That report, which examined TransUnion credit data from 2013, found 77 million Americans have debt 180 days past due, with the average person having about $5,178 in credit card, utility bill, or medical bill debt.

Fewer than one-third of American consumers have a passable understanding of their financial rights, according to a new study from FICO. In a comprehensive survey of U.S. bank customers, the analytics company found only 30 percent of those quizzed about their financial rights earned a passing grade, with only 1 percent achieving an A (with 92 percent of responses correct).

The company responsible for one of the most widely used measures of credit health is making changes to its current model that could boost credit scores nationwide. While the changes may have a significant impact on approval rates for credit cards and auto loans, the effects will be more subtle for borrowers and lenders in the mortgage space, says Greg McBride, chief financial analyst for personal finance website Bankrate.com.