For the first time in decades, mortgage lenders selling loans to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac can choose between Classic FICO and VantageScore 4.0 — with a third model, FICO 10T, on its way this summer. Here's what's actually changed for mortgage shoppers, and what hasn't.
FHFA and HUD announced in April 2026 that approved mortgage lenders can now choose between Classic FICO and VantageScore 4.0 for loans sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. A third model, FICO 10T, has historical scores expected this summer, with adoption still pending. Most lenders still use Classic FICO today — ask your lender which model they use.
For as long as most people have shopped for a mortgage, one company's scoring model has quietly decided who qualifies and at what rate: FICO. That's no longer automatically true. In April 2026, the federal regulator that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac confirmed that approved mortgage lenders can now choose a different model — VantageScore 4.0 — for loans they sell to either company, and a third model, FICO 10T, is on its way. If you're shopping for a mortgage this year, here's what's actually changed, what hasn't, and why it might matter to you.
On April 22, 2026, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Federal Housing Finance Agency jointly announced what they called a "new era of credit score competition" in home lending. The practical effect: mortgage lenders that have been approved for the transition can now choose between the traditional "Classic FICO" score and VantageScore 4.0 when originating a loan intended for sale to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac — the two government-sponsored enterprises that buy the majority of U.S. mortgages from lenders and package them for the secondary market.
This isn't a brand-new idea that appeared overnight. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac released historical VantageScore 4.0 data covering roughly a decade of loan acquisitions back in July 2024, effectively laying the groundwork for lenders to start testing the model against real loan performance before using it live. What changed in 2026 is that approved lenders can now actually originate loans using VantageScore 4.0 instead of Classic FICO, not just study how it would have performed retroactively.
A second new model, FICO 10T, is also in the pipeline. Per FHFA's own credit-scores policy page, historical FICO 10T scores are "expected to be published" in the summer of 2026, with full lender adoption still pending at a later, unspecified date. In plain terms: FICO 10T is being prepared the same way VantageScore 4.0 was in 2024 — compiling historical data first — before it becomes something a lender can actually use to originate your loan.
It's easy to read "new era of credit score competition" and assume every lender switched overnight. They haven't. FHFA is explicit that this is an interim phase: lenders that haven't been approved for the transition are still required to use Classic FICO, and even among approved lenders, adopting VantageScore 4.0 is a choice, not a mandate. FICO 10T isn't adoptable by any lender yet — the historical-score compilation step that VantageScore went through in 2024 is only now getting underway for FICO's newer model.
The mechanics of how your credit gets pulled also haven't moved. Lenders still request a tri-merge (all three bureaus) or bi-merge credit report the same way they always have; what's changing is which scoring formula gets applied to that underlying bureau data, not how many bureaus get checked or how the report itself is assembled.
VantageScore has built its case for adoption around two features Classic FICO doesn't use the same way: trended data (a borrower's payment and balance history over time, not just a single snapshot) and select alternative data, including rental, utility, and telecom payment history where reported. In VantageScore's own published materials, the company claims its model scores 33 million more consumers than traditional credit scores and, in one of its own analyses of mortgages originated between 2013 and 2023 (tracked through Fannie Mae's dataset), predicted "up to 49% more" mortgage defaults leading into the COVID-19 pandemic than Classic FICO did. Those are VantageScore's own competitive claims about its own product — worth knowing as context for why a lender might choose it, but not an independently verified, apples-to-apples comparison, and FICO's own newer models make comparable competitive claims about their own predictive improvements.
The practical upshot for a borrower: if you have a thin credit file — for example, you're a renter with a strong on-time payment history but little traditional credit — a lender using VantageScore 4.0 might generate a usable score where Classic FICO alone would not. If you have an established, longer credit history, the two models may land close to each other, or may not — there's no fixed, universal "point spread" between them, and neither FHFA nor either scoring company has published one.
FHFA describes this as a competition-driving move, and the timeline suggests it's designed to unfold gradually rather than all at once: VantageScore 4.0's historical groundwork took roughly two years (2024 to 2026) to reach live-lender adoption, and FICO 10T is only now entering that same historical-compilation phase. Expect the current mixed landscape — some lenders on Classic FICO, some now eligible to use VantageScore 4.0 — to persist for a while yet, with FICO 10T joining the mix later rather than sooner.
If you're weighing how your personal credit profile affects a business financing application rather than a home loan, that's a different — and often more forgiving — set of underwriting standards than mortgage lending uses; see our guide on fixing credit fast as a small business owner for that context.
*This post is educational and does not constitute mortgage, legal, or financial advice. ClearValue Lending is a small business funding platform, not a mortgage lender or a credit-scoring authority, and is not the party that decides which score model any individual mortgage lender adopts. Consult your lender and a qualified mortgage professional for guidance specific to your situation.*
No. Classic FICO is still the standard most mortgage lenders use today. Only lenders that have been approved for the transition can currently choose VantageScore 4.0 instead, and that's optional for them, not required.
FICO 10T is a newer FICO scoring model. As of mid-2026, FHFA's own policy page says historical FICO 10T scores are expected to be published this summer, with actual lender adoption still pending at a later date — it isn't something a mortgage lender can use to originate your loan yet.
There's no fixed answer. VantageScore markets its model as scoring more consumers, including some with thin credit files, by incorporating trended and select alternative data like rental payments. Whether that produces a higher or lower number than Classic FICO for a specific person depends on that person's credit history — neither FHFA nor the scoring companies have published a universal conversion between the two.
No. Tri-merge and bi-merge credit report pulls work the same as before; this transition only affects which scoring formula is applied to the bureau data that's already being pulled.