A pair of large national lenders joined the VantageScore vanguard this week, with both Pennymac and United Wholesale Mortgage (UWM) announcing broad-based rollouts of the credit scoring model.

Pennymac, a California-based lender-servicer, said it has now deployed VantageScore 4.0 across its production channels, including consumer direct, broker direct and correspondent.

Ranked by Scotsman Guide as the largest correspondent lender in the U.S., Pennymac expects implementation of VantageScore 4.0 in that channel will accelerate adoption of the model among smaller community lenders that sell loans to its correspondent arm.

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“Markets with more than one credible option tend to produce better products at a lower cost, and credit scoring should be no different,” David Spector, Pennymac’s chairman and CEO, stated in a company press release. “Each provider now has a reason to improve predictive accuracy, extend coverage and compete on price, and lenders have a basis for comparison they have not had before.”

UWM announced Tuesday that it will automatically pull credit scores using both VantageScore 4.0 and the legacy Classic FICO model, with the Michigan-based wholesale lender defaulting to the best score for each borrower.

“No one should have to worry about which credit model wins,” UWM President and CEO Mat Ishbia said in a press release. “We handle that automatically by obtaining FICO and Vantage on all credit pulls to help consumers save more money and improve affordability, empowering brokers to close more loans.”

Rocket Mortgage has taken a different approach, announcing on Sept. 28 that VantageScore 4.0 will become its “preferred credit scoring model” for loans eligible for delivery to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Rocket noted that based on four months of testing, VantageScore “helped more clients qualify and move forward in the mortgage process, while also reducing credit scoring costs.”

The cascade of companies introducing VantageScore into their lending ecosystems follows a Sept. 3 social media proclamation by Bill Pulte, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA).

“EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY, I’m instructing Fannie and Freddie to approve ALL lenders to use VantageScore,” Pulte wrote on X, positioning the move as part of a broader shift to increase competition in credit scoring.

The FHFA has also signaled its intention to adopt the newer FICO 10T model, though it is still in the testing stage for Fannie and Freddie implementation.