❌ Denied By
Large National Bank
"I made mistakes during COVID. I fixed them. The national bank held it against me forever. FHA looked at who I am now."
— Anonymous · Georgia · Submitted to FRC Rejection Database
What Actually Changed
Lates were from 2019 — over 4 years old. National bank still flagged them. FHA lender only cares about last 12 months of payment history. Zero recent lates = approved.
🏦 Banker's Take
FHA underwriting focuses heavily on the last 12-24 months. Older derogatory marks carry much less weight. If your recent payment history is clean, FHA may approve where conventional lenders won't.
The Pattern This Story Reveals
This story follows the most common pattern in our database: the problem wasn't the borrower's finances. It was which lender they walked into first. Different lender types have fundamentally different underwriting criteria — and most applicants don't know this until after the denial.
Lender Type Comparison
Large National BankMost Strict — 43% DTI max, 680+ score
Credit UnionFlexible — 45-47% DTI, 640+ score
FHA LenderMost Flexible — 57% DTI, 580+ score
Portfolio LenderCase by Case — bank statements accepted
See How Each Lender Would Score You
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Have a Similar Story?
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More Real Approval Stories
The part almost nobody publishes free
Prices and rates are widely reported. Whether a lender says yes is not. In the complete 2025 federal record, denial rates across the 100 largest FHA lenders ran from 1.8% to 78.7% — same programme, same year.
And it is not simply who applies where: standardizing on state, loan amount, income, debt-to-income and loan-to-value, applicant mix explains only a 2.7× range in expected outcomes.
CFPB HMDA 2025, computed by FinanceRateCalc. Covers the highest-volume lenders published per market, not all lenders. Historical observations, not predictions. CC BY 4.0, not independently reproduced.
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