Large Lender Makes Announcement of Minimum 620 Credit Score

In the last few months, only a select few lenders have not required a minimum of a 620 credit score on all Florida FHA streamline refinances. Yesterday, the last major lender who used to not require a minimum credit score has announced that they now require a 620 credit score for all Florida FHA streamline refinance loans. The major announcement came from TB&W that they were moving their minimum credit score requirement to 620 for all Florida FHA streamline mortgage refinances.

Details Of The Announcement:

FHA Streamlines (credit and non-credit qualifying) and VA IRRRL’s with Credit Scores below 620 must be LOCKED prior to July 13, 2009 AND must CLOSE (Note Date) no later than September 15, 2009, and must be delivered to TBW within 10 days after closing Loans in this category locked on and after July 13, 2009 will require a minimum FICO of 620.

Clients will be required to obtain a 3 Repository credit report and utilize the standard method of determining qualifying FICO. Any Conventional, FHA (including Streamline Refinance), or VA (including IRRRL) loan that exceeds $417,000 with a Credit Scores below 660 must be LOCKED prior to July 13, 2009 AND must CLOSE (Note Date) no later than September 15, 2009, and must be delivered to TBW within 10 days after closing Loans in this category locked on and after July 13, 2009 will require a minimum FICO of 660.

Clients will be required to obtain a 3 Repository credit report and utilize the standard method of determining qualifying FICO. In addition, any previously announced minimum Credit Score requirements that TB&W has put into place, that did not have a specified Closing date, will be required to be LOCKED prior to July 13, 2009 AND must CLOSE (Note Date) no later than September 15, 2009, and must be delivered within 10 days after closing. Therefore, any loan, regardless of whether it may be locked, registered or approved, that has a qualifying credit score below 620 (with the exception of those loans that have specified higher FICO requirements) must CLOSE (Note Date) no later than September 15, 2009.

TB&W will continue to allow non-traditional credit for those borrowers with no useable credit for the loan programs that allow the use of such credit in accordance with published guidelines. TB&W is fully aware that these limitations may result in the inability for a particular loan to meet these specified deadlines. TB&W will work as diligently as possible to accommodate all loans in the pipeline. We will be unable to grant any extensions or exceptions to these requirements.

Florida FHA Streamline Refinance: What Does This Mean?

Although FHA guidelines don’t require a minimum credit score, pretty much all lenders now require that you have at least a 620 score for the Florida FHA streamline refinance loan program. TB&W was the last major US lender who was not requiring that you had at least a 620 minimum credit score. It is possible that there are still smaller lenders who can offer the Florida FHA refinance streamline loan with no minimum credit score requirement, but don’t expect it to be easy to find them.

Florida FHA Streamline Refinance Requires 620 Credit Score is a post from: Florida Mortgage Team