From Bloomberg, Thrusday, November 15:

Freddie Mac, the second-largest source of money for U.S. home loans, joined Fannie Mae in introducing or raising fees on mortgages the company buys from lenders because of the increased risks in slumping housing and mortgage markets.

Freddie Mac is primarily setting new fees for mortgages made to borrowers with credit scores below 680, whose loans exceed 70 percent of their property’s value. The new charges range from 0.75 percent to 2 percent depending on credit scores, according to a bulletin by the company. The changes take effect March 1.
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Freddie Mac’s changes are “in response to continuing volatility and turmoil in the mortgage market, including the deteriorating performance of higher-risk mortgage products,” the McLean, Virginia-based company said in a letter on its Web site.

It also said mortgages from markets with falling prices must now have loan-to-value ratios at least five percentage points below normal requirements for mortgages with the same attributes.
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Under Freddie Mac’s new fee system, a lender selling a mortgage to the company from a borrower with a credit score of 675 who made less than a 30 percent down payment for the purchase of a $300,000 home will forfeit $2,250 in charges. The lender, which would typically make less than $3,000 on the sale, could get paid more by raising the interest rate on the loan.