What Is a Good Credit Score to Buy a House?

The short answer: you can often get a mortgage with a score in the low 600s, and sometimes the 500s — but the best interest rates generally go to borrowers around 740 and above. Exact requirements vary by lender and can change, so treat these as common baselines rather than guarantees.

Typical minimums by loan type

These are program guidelines — individual lenders often set higher bars (called “overlays”), and approval also depends on your income, debts, and down payment, not just the score.

Why the score matters beyond approval

Your score affects your rate, and small rate differences are enormous over 30 years. Conventional loan pricing uses tiers (typically 620, 640, 660, 680, 700, 720, 740, 760+), and moving up even one tier can lower your rate. On a $300,000 loan, a half-percent rate difference can mean roughly $30,000–$35,000 over the life of a 30-year loan, depending on rates at the time.

Which score do lenders actually use?

Mortgage lenders have traditionally pulled FICO scores from all three bureaus and used the middle one (or the lower middle score between co-borrowers). The mortgage industry has been transitioning to updated scoring models, so the exact version may differ by lender — but the practical advice is the same: the free score in your banking app is an estimate, not necessarily what a lender will see.

If your score isn’t there yet

The fastest levers are usually paying down credit card balances (utilization updates quickly — try our credit utilization calculator), disputing genuine errors on your reports at AnnualCreditReport.com, and avoiding new credit applications in the months before you apply. Late payments hurt most when recent, so a clean recent record helps even if older marks remain.

A good move before house shopping: check your debt-to-income ratio too, since lenders weigh it alongside your score.