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A-minus Mortgages
Expand your market potential through lower rates for borrowers with past credit challenges

Related Products

With the Loan Prospector® A-minus Mortgage, you'll easily approve more borrowers with a less-than-perfect credit history or limited funds for a down payment. With A-minus Mortgages, your borrowers with past credit challenges can get competitive rates and have a variety of down payment alternatives. With Home Possible® Mortgage a down payment may not be required at all.

A-minus is a win for everyone; you'll diversify your offerings with enhanced alternatives, and your borrowers with complex financial situations will have more options to qualify for home financing that put them into homes they can both afford and keep.

Through a Loan Prospector assessment for A-minus Mortgages, you'll further streamline your process. Loan Prospector includes a feedback message that clearly identifies A-minus eligibility.

You'll offer your borrowers additional options when you originate Home Possible Mortgages, Investment Property Mortgages, most standard ARMs and other products as A-minus Mortgages.

Product Features

Feature Requirements

Property Type
  • 1- to 4-unit primary residences, including condos, PUDs and manufactured homes.
  • Second homes
  • 1- to 4-unit investment properties

Eligible Mortgage Products
  • 15-, 20-, 30- and 40-year fixed-rate mortgages
  • Most standard ARMs
  • 7-year balloon/reset mortgages
  • Originate with Home Possible Mortgages
  • Affordable Merit Rate Mortgages are part of our A-minus offering, with additional requirements. At this time, 40-year fixed-rate terms have not been extended to Affordable Merit Rate Mortgages.

Transaction Type
  • Purchase
  • No cash-out refinance
  • Cash-out refinances

Maximum LTV Ratios (without secondary financing)
  • Maximum LTV ratios must comply with Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide (Guide) Section 23.4.

Eligibility/Underwriting

  • Loan Prospector Caution loans that receive a special purchase eligibility code and the following feedback message: 500 Freddie Mac Eligible. LP A–minus Offering
  • For all mortgage payment histories not verified on the Loan Prospector credit reports, the Seller must directly verify and document any mortgage payment histories and warrant that during the prior 12-month period, each borrower was not 30 days or more delinquent more than twice, and was never 60 days or more delinquent on any directly verified mortgage or combination of directly verified mortgages.
  • All mortgages that are identified as A-minus eligible by Loan Prospector and that meet the requirements of Guide Chapter C33 will be considered A-minus Mortgages by Freddie Mac.  Mortgages that are identified as A-minus eligible but do not meet the requirements of Guide Chapters C33 or E33 are not eligible for sale to Freddie Mac as A-minus Mortgages, but may be eligible for delivery as Caution mortgages if they meet the requirements of Guide Chapter 37.

Execution Options
  • Servicing-released Cash*
  • Servicing-retained Cash
  • WAC ARM Cash
  • Fixed-rate Guarantor
  • WAC ARM Guarantor
  • MultiLender Swap

* 15-, 20-, 30- and 40-year fixed-rate A-minus Mortgages only. See our selling system availability matrix [PDF 13K] for a list of specific A-minus Mortgages eligible for sale through Cash under mandatory contracts servicing released and best efforts contracts with servicing released or retained.

Delivery Fees
  • The Loan Prospector CS/LTV (A-minus) Fee Level returned on your Loan Prospector Feedback Certificate for A-minus and other Caution mortgages corresponds to the actual Loan Prospector CS/LTV (A-minus) Fee rate listed in Guide Exhibit 19.  This will be the rate used to calculate the "A-minus" fee you'll be assessed on your monthly Seller Invoice when you supply accurate data.
  • See Guide Exhibit 19 [PDF 214K] for details on these fees and all other applicable fees.

Special Delivery Requirements
  • You are required to deliver the Loan Prospector Key Number for all Loan Prospector mortgages.

Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide
  • Refer to Guide Chapter C33.


Download an A-minus Mortgage fact sheet [PDF 188K] for more details.

Lender Benefits

Loan Prospector A-minus Mortgages help you:

  • Expand your market base by providing a lower-cost source of financing for a large segment of borrowers with past credit challenges.
  • Enhance your CRA-eligible originations, particularly when combining with Home Possible Mortgages.
  • Use Loan Prospector to reduce costs, streamline your origination process, standardize your product line, and obtain creditworthiness representation and warranty relief.
  • Commingle A-minus loans with other conventional, conforming loans when delivering to Freddie Mac.

Benefits for Your Borrowers

A-minus Mortgages help your borrowers:

  • Take advantage of a variety of alternatives for down payment and secondary financing available with many Freddie Mac mortgage products that may qualify as A-minus loans.
  • Obtain home financing at rates that are closer to conventional, conforming rates.

For More Information

Training Opportunities

Visit The Learning Center for live and recorded web conferences, access to classroom-style workshops and self-study tools – all designed to help you stay competitive, serve more borrowers and make it easier to do business with us.

The information in this document is not a replacement or substitute for information found in the Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide and/or the terms of your Master Agreement and/or Master Commitment.



© 2008 Freddie Mac