Judith, the truth is FHA is not FICO driven regardless of what you are hearing. FHA is NOT a lender, it is an insurance issuer. FHA insures riskier loans and allows people that might not otherwise get a loan, in fact get one because FHA is saying to these lenders, " Go ahead and give this person the money, we will insure you so that if they default on this we will pick up all or a portion of what you lost on this loan."
But lenders have fico score " overlays". So FHA will not have a problem with your 570 score, but most lenders will not go below 620 now because lenders are very concerned about losing any more moeny and do not want to put any more loans on their books that could go delinquent and FICO score is a good indication of possible late payments.
I have one lender that will underwrite loans down to a 580 FICO. You are very close and I would love to see the credit report to let you know where you can make some quick changes and get your score to that level with a rapid rescore.
If you would like more information, please contact me and I would be glad to help. I do not charge for this review.
Andrew Kashella
AKashella@TLTLoans,com
727-331-8405 - Wed Dec 2 2009, 06:50