What Are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?

Fannie Mae (the Federal National Mortgage Association) and Freddie Mac (the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation) are shareholder-owned companies chartered by Congress that buy home loans from lenders and package them into mortgage-backed securities they guarantee. They do not lend to you directly; a bank, credit union, or mortgage company makes your loan and may sell it to one of them. Both have operated under government conservatorship, run by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), since September 6, 2008.

Why do Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac exist?

They exist to keep money flowing to mortgage lenders across the country, including during financial stress. Fannie Mae was first chartered by the federal government in 1938. Congress chartered Freddie Mac in 1970 as a private company. FHFA describes their job as supplying funds to banks, savings institutions, and mortgage companies and supporting lending for affordable housing.

Without a buyer for its loans, a lender can lend only as much as it holds in deposits or can borrow. Selling a loan soon after closing returns the lender's cash so it can make the next loan.

How do they buy and guarantee loans?

The process for a loan they buy works like this:

1. A lender makes your loan. It must follow Fannie Mae's or Freddie Mac's rules for credit, income, down payment, and loan size. A loan that meets those rules is called a conforming loan.
2. The lender sells the loan. Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac buys it.
3. The loan is pooled into a security. The company combines your loan with similar loans into a mortgage-backed security (MBS), a bond paid from the monthly payments on the loans in it, and sells it to investors. It may also hold some loans in its own portfolio.
4. The company guarantees the payments. Investors receive their principal and interest on time even if some borrowers stop paying. Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac charges a guarantee fee for that promise, paid out of the interest on the loans in the pool.

The loan size limit matters most to buyers. For 2026, the conforming loan limit for a one-unit home is $832,750 in most of the country and up to $1,249,125 in high-cost areas, with higher limits in Alaska, Hawaii, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The limit for your county controls. A loan above it is a jumbo loan, which the two companies do not buy; see jumbo and super jumbo loans. For the borrower rules on credit score, debt, and down payment, see the requirements of a Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac loan. For how the securities work for investors, see what a mortgage-backed security is.

When a loan is sold, the new owner must send you a notice. Your servicer, the company that collects your monthly payment, can tell you who owns the loan at any time.

What is the difference between Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?

Today they do much the same work under the same regulator. Both buy conforming loans from banks and from nonbank mortgage companies, both answer to FHFA, and since June 2019 both issue a single common security, the Uniform Mortgage-Backed Security (UMBS), through a company they jointly own. For you as a borrower, the differences are in program names, some eligibility details, and the tools lenders use:

The agency market is about $9.4 trillion of securities from Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae; Ginnie Mae holds the remaining 30.3%. Freddie Mac's Home Possible allows 3% down for buyers with income at or below 80% of the area median. Some homeowner rules depend on which company owns your loan, such as the conditions for canceling private mortgage insurance based on a new appraisal.

What does conservatorship mean?

On September 6, 2008, FHFA placed both companies into conservatorship with the consent of their boards, using authority Congress gave it in the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008. As conservator, FHFA holds the powers of each company's management, board, and shareholders. The U.S. Treasury supports both companies through preferred stock purchase agreements signed on September 7, 2008, and amended since.

As of October 22, 2026, both companies still operate under conservatorship. Those agreements cap each company's investment portfolio at $225 billion. Both portfolios grew in the year to July 2026 (Fannie Mae's to $173.4 billion and Freddie Mac's to $139.7 billion) as the companies bought more agency MBS under a Trump administration directive aimed at lowering mortgage rates. For how much blame they carry for the crisis, see whether Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac caused the 2008 mortgage crisis.

How do you find out if Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac owns your loan?

Use either of these:

1. Online lookup tools. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac each run a free loan lookup on their websites. Freddie Mac's asks for your property address and the last four digits of your Social Security number, or you can send an email request instead. It warns that a typo or abbreviation can return the wrong answer. If one tool finds no match, try the other.
2. Ask your servicer. Call the number on your monthly statement, or send a written request for information. Your servicer must give you, to the best of its knowledge, the name, address, and phone number of the loan's owner.

Knowing the owner tells you which company's rules apply to your loan for hardship help and for removing mortgage insurance early. If you want to buy a home Fannie Mae took back through foreclosure, see how to buy a Fannie Mae foreclosure.