In the New White House Plan, A Good Credit Score Means Bad News For Homeowners

A lot of press has centered around the newly announced mortgage rate freeze and loan modification plan announced by the White House recently to help stop foreclosures, but today was the first mention I’ve seen of a maximim FICO score applied to this plan.

According to the San Jose Mercury News, you are only eligible for this program if your FICO score was under 660 when you applied for the loan and hasn’t improved more than 10% in the meantime.  Evidentally, we are only helping out people who can’t pay their bills and weren’t able to when they were granted a mortgage! 

In today’s economic morass, there have to be many people facing foreclosure who had a great credit score when they got their loan, but have had extenuating circumstances force them into hardship.  Don’t these people deserve help also?  Does anyone else see this plan as unfair to those who worked hard to pay their bills, even through tough times? 

According to reports, the idea was to eliminate those who could qualify for a refinance from this program.  Given the tighter requirements for bank refinancing, many with FICO scores between 660 and 720 will also have difficulties.   

Comments, anyone?