Fitzgerald Introduces Bill to Codify Credit Reporting Practices for Homebuyers
WASHINGTON, DC – RealEstateRama – Congressman Scott Fitzgerald (WI-05) released the following statement after introducing the Accurate Credit Reporting for Homebuyers Act, a bill to codify the long-standing requirement that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac obtain a credit report and credit score on a borrower from each of the three national credit bureaus when they purchase a residential mortgage loan—otherwise known as the “tri-merge requirement.”
“President Biden’s financial regulators seem to rely more on ideology than facts and data, and the FHFA’s proposal to shift from a tri-merge to bi-merge credit reporting requirement is just the latest example,” said Rep. Fitzgerald. “The FHFA’s proposal could be the obstacle that keeps borrowers from obtaining a mortgage if they have lower FICO scores but are otherwise credit-worthy. My bill corrects this misguided proposal by codifying the long-standing requirement that Enterprises obtain a credit report and credit score on a borrower from each of the three national credit bureaus.”
Background: On October 24, 2022, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) announced that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would transition to a bi-merge average and depart from the longstanding method of using the median of a tri-merge requirement of credit reports. In that announcement, FHFA stated that it “expects this update will promote competition in the market while maintaining the information needed to support robust risk management.” However, FHFA has never released any analysis or data to support this expectation.
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