FHFA May Move Fannie, Freddie From Tri-Merge to Bi-Merge

Weekly Real Estate News reported Oct. 1 that the Federal Housing Finance Agency is preparing to direct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to require mortgage lenders to pull credit data from two of the three national credit bureaus instead of all three, according to a person familiar with the plans cited by Bloomberg Law. FHFA has not formally announced the change. The report says a directive could come within weeks, possibly as soon as Oct. 12, when FHFA Director Bill Pulte is scheduled to speak at the MBA Annual Convention in Chicago.

• Mortgage lenders currently rely on merged credit data from Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion for loans sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. A bi-merge system would cut that down to two of the three.
• FHFA first raised bi-merge in 2023 as part of a broader overhaul of credit score requirements, then postponed the timeline in January 2025 after industry feedback.
• No implementation details have been published yet. Open questions include whether the change would be mandatory, how lenders would choose which two bureaus to use, and how it would interact with the growing use of VantageScore 4.0 on GSE loans.

At Informative Research, we built the industry's first TriMerge Credit Report back in 1978, so a shift to bi-merge would touch a process we know well. If FHFA follows through, lenders will need clarity on bureau selection, pricing, and how the change lines up with FICO and VantageScore adoption before they can plan for it. IR is watching this closely and will help clients work through whatever the final guidance looks like.