Latest news with #FannieMae
Associated Press
20 hours ago
- Business
- Associated Press
New Credit Score Option for Home Loans Starts Today
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Add VantageScore 4.0 to Help More Americans Qualify for Home Loans 'This could help people with different credit histories get approved for loans, But it may take some time for lenders to fully adjust their processes and policies.''— Jason 'J.D.' Koontz CHARLOTTE, NC, UNITED STATES, July 22, 2025 / / -- The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) announced on July 11, 2025, that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will now accept a new credit score model, VantageScore 4.0, for mortgage underwriting. The change takes effect immediately. Lenders can use it without requiring significant system overhauls, thanks to its compatibility with existing tri-merge credit reports from Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. About VantageScore 4.0 Developed by the VantageScore consortium, a joint venture of the three major credit bureaus, VantageScore 4.0 uses machine learning and trended data to more accurately predict credit risk, especially for consumers with thin or non-traditional credit files. VantageScore 4.0 includes rent, utility, and phone payments data that could help up to 33 million more Americans qualify for a mortgage. This shift follows the End of GSE Conservatorship Preparation Act of 2025; a bipartisan law aimed at increasing competition in credit scoring. FHFA had first approved VantageScore 4.0 in 2022 but delayed implementation to address concerns from the mortgage industry. Plans to allow other score models, such as FICO 10T or a two-bureau option, remain under review with no start date yet. What This Means for You Imagine you're 22, just out of college, and renting an apartment for $1,000 per month. You've never had a credit card or loan, so your FICO score is too low to qualify for a mortgage. With VantageScore 4.0, your on-time rent payments can now count toward your credit history. This could help you qualify for a $200,000 home loan with a $1,250 monthly principal and interest payment. It gives you the opportunity to start building equity in a starter home instead of continuing to rent. Industry Perspectives and Considerations Koontz noted that while the adoption of VantageScore 4.0 is a promising development for expanding credit access, implementation may not be uniform across all lenders. Some institutions may move quickly to incorporate the new model, while others may take a more cautious approach, waiting for additional guidance and data from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In the meantime, borrowers are encouraged to consult with their lenders to understand how this change could affect their mortgage applications. About J.D. Koontz J.D. Koontz is a nationally recognized banking expert and consultant with over 20 years of experience advising financial institutions, regulatory agencies, and legal teams. He specializes in regulatory compliance, credit model evaluation, and litigation support, and is frequently quoted in national financial publications. Jason 'J.D.' Koontz Jason D. Koontz Expert Witness +1 646-397-3835 [email protected] Visit us on social media: LinkedIn Legal Disclaimer: EIN Presswire provides this news content 'as is' without warranty of any kind. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, images, videos, licenses, completeness, legality, or reliability of the information contained in this article. If you have any complaints or copyright issues related to this article, kindly contact the author above.
Yahoo
a day ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump accuses impeachment leader Schiff of ‘mortgage fraud' over Maryland home he keeps while repping California
President Donald Trump called for California Senator Adam Schiff to be prosecuted for what he described as 'mortgage fraud' as he claimed his longtime political foe has broken the law by previously claiming a home in suburban Maryland as his primary residence. Writing on Truth Social Tuesday, the president claimed he'd been given information from the federally-backed mortgage lender Fannie Mae indicating that Schiff, who led the investigation leading to the president's first impeachment trial, 'has engaged in a sustained pattern of possible Mortgage Fraud.' He accused the first-term senator of having falsely claimed a Potomac, Maryland, house he has owned for decades as a 'primary residence' while representing California in Congress, thereby gaining a more favorable interest rate than he otherwise would have been entitled to. 'Adam Schiff said that his primary residence was in MARYLAND to get a cheaper mortgage and rip off America, when he must LIVE in CALIFORNIA because he was a Congressman from CALIFORNIA. I always knew Adam Schiff was a Crook,' Trump said. The Democrat accused Trump of a 'baseless attempt at political retribution' in a post on X Tuesday. 'Since I led his first impeachment, Trump has repeatedly called for me to be arrested for treason,' Schiff said. 'So in a way, I guess this is a bit of a letdown. And this baseless attempt at political retribution won't stop me from holding him accountable. Not by a long shot.' President Donald Trump accused political rival and Democrat Adam Schiff of 'mortgage fraud' for his Maryland home. (Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved) The president added that the alleged 'fraud' ran from a 2009 refinancing of Schiff's Maryland house until he designated it as a second home in 2020. Schiff has represented California in D.C. since 2001 and, for almost all of that time, has kept a home in Maryland, where he has lived with his wife and where his children have attended public schools. He also keeps a condominium in Burbank, California, which is part of his former Los Angeles-area House district. It was once common for House and Senate members to bring their families to Washington before the practice was turned into fodder for campaign attacks by Republicans during the 1994 midterm elections. In recent years, most members have kept their families back home for fear of political fallout, with some going so far as to sleep in their offices to avoid establishing any roots in the nation's capital. Other senators have faced questions over their Capital-area residences. Schiff's predecessor, former senator Laphonza Butler, was forced to re-register to vote in California after she was appointed to the seat following the death of longtime California senator Dianne Feinstein. Butler, a longtime Democratic activist and operative, had longstanding ties to the Golden State but had been registered to vote in the Washington area. Schiff's ownership of the Maryland property was reported on during his Senate campaign by CNN, which at the time reported that the then-House member wasn't likely to face any legal repercussions because the law at issue is ambiguous when it comes to the definition of a primary residence. But Marisol Samayoa, Schiff's spokesperson during the campaign and his current press secretary, told CNN last year that he has claimed both his properties as primary residences for mortgage purposes 'because they are both occupied throughout the year and to distinguish them from a vacation property.' Schiff has been a top political target of Trump's since his first administration and is often on the receiving end of the president's ire (AFP/Getty) Schiff has been a top political target of Trump's since his first administration and is often on the receiving end of the president's ire. Schiff played a prominent role in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and served as chair of the House Intelligence Committee in 2019. Trump and Republicans ramped up their attacks on Schiff after special counsel Robert Mueller did not find sufficient evidence of criminal conspiracy. The president hurled numerous insults at Schiff, including 'pencil neck,' 'Schifty Schiff' and 'watermelon head.' The Democrat became the lead prosecutor in 2020 at Trump's first impeachment trial, where Trump was acquitted by the Senate. Schiff also served on the House's January 6 committee.
Bloomberg
2 days ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
Privatization Would Make Housing More Unaffordable: DoubleLine
DoubleLine Deputy CIO Jeffrey Sherman speaks with Katie Greifeld and Scarlet Fu on "Bloomberg ETF IQ." Privatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac risks a return to the kind of perilous mortgages that helped cause the global financial crisis unless regulatory safeguards are kept in place, an affordable housing nonprofit said in a paper in June. (Source: Bloomberg)
Fox News
2 days ago
- Politics
- Fox News
Trump invokes Russia collusion hoax while calling for longtime foe Schiff to face jail time
President Donald Trump called for California Democrat Sen. Adam Schiff to face jail time while invoking recently declassified documents alleging Obama administration officials "manufactured and politicized intelligence" to create the narrative that Russia was attempting to influence the 2016 presidential election. "Adam 'Shifty' Schiff is in BIG TROUBLE!" Trump posted to Truth Social Sunday evening. "He falsified Loan Documents. He once said my son would go to prison on a SCAM that Schiff, along with other Crooked Dems, illegally 'manufactured' in order to stage an actual coup." "My son did nothing wrong, knew nothing about the fictional story," he added. "It was an American Tragedy! Now Shifty should pay the price of prison for a real crime, not one made up by the corrupt accusers!" Schiff is under scrutiny after the U.S. Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) sent a letter to the Department of Justice in May sounding the alarm that in "multiple instances," Schiff allegedly "falsified bank documents and property records to acquire more favorable loan terms, impacting payments from 2003-2019 for a Potomac, Maryland-based property." FHFA is an independent federal agency that oversees Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Bank System. Schiff's office did not respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment Monday morning. Trump publicly lambasted Schiff Tuesday over the alleged mortgage fraud, while Fannie Mae's financial crimes investigations concluded last week in a letter to the FHFA that Schiff allegedly engaged in "a sustained pattern of possible occupancy misrepresentation" on five Fannie Mae loans, Fox News Digital previously reported. "I have always suspected Shifty Adam Schiff was a scam artist," Trump posted to Truth Social Tuesday. "And now I learn that Fannie Mae's Financial Crimes Division have concluded that Adam Schiff has engaged in a sustained pattern of possible Mortgage Fraud." "Adam Schiff said that his primary residence was in MARYLAND to get a cheaper mortgage and rip off America, when he must LIVE in CALIFORNIA because he was a Congressman from CALIFORNIA. I always knew Adam Schiff was a Crook. The FRAUD began with the refinance of his Maryland property on February 6, 2009, and continued through multiple transactions until the Maryland property was correctly designated as a second home on October 13, 2020." Schiff has passed off the allegations as a continuation of Trump's history of slamming the liberal lawmaker. "Since I led his first impeachment, Trump has repeatedly called for me to be arrested for treason," Schiff posted to X earlier in July after Trump first accused Schiff of mortgage fraud. "So in a way, I guess this is a bit of a letdown. And this baseless attempt at political retribution won't stop me from holding him accountable. Not by a long shot." Trump and Schiff have long been political foes, which was underscored during Trump's first administration when Schiff served as the lead House manager during the first impeachment trial against Trump in 2020, and when Schiff repeatedly promoted claims that Trump's 2016 campaign colluded with Russia. Days after Trump first posted about Schiff's mortgages in Maryland and California, the president's Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard declassified documents that reportedly show "overwhelming evidence" that then-President Barack Obama and his national security team laid the groundwork for what would be the yearslong Trump–Russia collusion probe after Trump's election win against former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2016. "It lays out, these over 100 documents that you're referencing, that I declassified and released, spells out in great detail exactly what happens when you have some of the most powerful people in our country directly leading at the helm, President Obama and his senior-most national security cabinet, James Comey, John Brennan, James Clapper, and Susan Rice and others, essentially making a very intentional decision to create this manufactured, politicized piece of intelligence with the objective of subverting the will of the American people," Gabbard told Fox News' Sean Hannity Friday evening. She argued that the goal of Obama and his team was to essentially "not accept the decision of the American people" in 2016, and to use this "manufactured, politicized piece of intelligence" as a means to enact a "years-long coup against President Trump." Schiff was an incredibly vocal lawmaker amid the Russian collusion claims, most notably when the House censured him in 2023 over his promotion that Trump's 2016 campaign colluded with Russia. Schiff served in the House representing California from 2001 to 2024, when he was sworn-in as a senator after his successful 2024 campaign to serve in the nation's upper chamber. Schiff served as the ranking member of the House intelligence committee from 2015 to 2019, before becoming the committee's chair from 2019 to 2023. In that role, Schiff was kept up to date on classified materials surrounding the Russian collusion claims. Schiff advocated in 2018 that Donald Trump Jr., the president's son, face a subpoena amid Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into claims Trump's 2016 campaign colluded with Russia to secure the election, which Trump cited in his latest Truth Social aimed at Schiff. Mueller's investigation, which wrapped up in March 2019, into the Russia claims determined there was no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Trump's Vile, Corrupt Attack on Adam Schiff Is Already Backfiring
This week, President Donald Trump raged on Truth Social that Senator Adam Schiff is guilty of 'Mortgage Fraud,' and demanded that he be 'brought to justice.' The basis for this claim: Fannie Mae has made a criminal referral to the Justice Department involving several properties owned by the first-term California Democrat. Many stories on this dutifully reported Trump's allegations of corruption, and then followed up with Schiff's response: That the charges are bogus and constitute retribution against a longtime Trump critic who argued the case for his impeachment in the House during his first term. This framing makes it a story about Schiff's conduct. But the real story here is Trump's conduct. It's how this allegation came to be in the first place. It's the role that Trump and/or the White House played in getting the federal bureaucracy to arrange events to the point where the president of the United States could pronounce a sitting U.S. senator and political enemy a target for potential prosecution. Understood this way, the story is likely a dry run for much more like this to come. The unnerving outlines of that story are already visible. The allegations, in a nutshell, are that Schiff falsely designated his Maryland home in the suburbs of Washington D.C. a primary residence even as his real primary home is in California. This allegedly secured Schiff a cheaper mortgage. Fannie Mae referred this to DOJ, and Trump followed up with this, an apparent message to DOJ that it should prosecute: Schiff flatly denies the claim. His spokesperson says Schiff has always been open about owning year-round residences in both Maryland and California. Keeping one residence in a home state or district and renting or owning a second place to stay in or around D.C. is standard for members of Congress. But where did the allegation initially come from? A Los Angeles Times reporter obtained a memo authored by the Fannie Mae Crimes Unit and sent to the head of the Federal Housing Finance Authority (FHFA), which oversees the government-backed Fannie Mae. The memo lays out the basis for those charges, but as the Times piece on this reports, the memo nowhere says that Schiff committed 'fraud,' as Trump claimed. Even more interestingly, the memo also says this inquiry resulted after the FHFA's office of inspector general (OIG) made a 'Document Demand' from the Fannie Mae Crimes Unit—a demand for documents related to 'all' loans 'associated with' Schiff. Experts in how inspectors general function said in interviews that this chain of events seems unusual and troubling. The FHFA inspector general obviously investigates mortgage fraud, they noted, but they asked how—and why—this inspector general might have come to make this specific request involving this specific U.S. Senator's loans. 'From beginning to end, this process is highly irregular,' Michael Bromwich, a former Justice Department inspector general who's still well regarded by government insiders, told me. Making this stranger, these issues involving Schiff have been aired before, during his 2024 Senate campaign, when multiple of Schiff's Fannie Mae loans and residences came to light. As CNN reported at the time, his spokesperson argued that it was appropriate to describe both residences as primary because they both function that way for the Schiffs (and also to distinguish them from a vacation home). The Fannie Mae memo itself is squirrelly with its charges. It claims that Schiff 'possibly' misrepresented his homes on multiple loans. Read through Trump's whole tweet on this and it's clear that someone or other created a tidy package of these charges and handed them to Trump—or whoever wrote this tweet—to translate into this missive. How did that happen? Experts also point out that the memo shows that the response to the inspector general's request was forwarded to the head of FHFA—William Pulte, a Trump political appointee and loyalist. 'It is extremely unusual for the response to any IG document request to go to the head of the agency rather than back to the OIG—I have never heard of that,' Bromwich told me. 'So far as I know, it is unprecedented for such raw information to be forwarded to the White House. Responses to OIG requests simply don't go to the White House—ever.' Did anyone at the White House urge this inspector general to make this document request involving Schiff? Did anyone at the White House quietly hint to Fannie Mae that it should criminally refer this matter to DOJ? Is anyone making an offhand suggestion to DOJ that it open a criminal investigation on this basis? 'The creation of an investigation into a high government official is extraordinarily unusual for a Fannie Mae inspector general,' Don Kettl, former Dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, told me. 'What drove this through the bureaucracy? What drove it to DOJ? How did the story find its way into the president's social media feed?' Making this worse, this tactic is already emerging as a model. As Talking Points Memo's David Kurtz points out, Trump alleged mortgage fraud against New York attorney general Letitia James, who sued the Trump Organization for fraud, via similar channels. 'Inspectors general are supposed to serve as checks on the president, but it looks like Trump is weaponizing them to attack his political opponents,' Brown University professor Corey Brettschneider, an expert on presidential power, tells me. Meanwhile, over at The Bulwark, Jonathan Last writes about another sordid tale involving a former FBI special agent who was pushed out because he was friends with someone on Trumpist FBI director Kash Patel's enemies list. As Last notes, this couldn't happen without little-known functionaries below Patel being willing to carry out dubious orders. So on this Schiff matter, are any Trump political appointees at FHFA or Fannie Mae proving, shall we say, very receptive to White House suggestions of investigative targets? Are they eagerly moving these suggestions through the bureaucracy? These questions are all critical to answer even if you believe the charges against Schiff will end up having something to them (which they probably won't). What's more, Democrats need to communicate clearly to the public that instances like these are part of a bigger story: Trump is corrupting the bureaucracy—corrupting the people's government—by seeding it with loyalists at all levels who are willing to manipulate it to carry out his crazed vendettas. As Brian Beutler explains, this sort of deep corruption of multiple agencies will inevitably create a need later to 'de-Trumpify' them. Democrats should loudly let it be known right now that anyone who is carrying out corrupt orders—or illegal ones—will not be able to hide behind bureaucratic obscurity later. They will be held accountable—politically, or if needed, legally as well. There are a lot of lingering questions about this whole Schiff mess. And when we start getting real answers to them, one suspects that this story will not look like the one Trump initially set out to tell.
