Fannie Mae Launches AI-Powered Mortgage Fraud Prevention

Fannie Mae is partnering with artificial intelligence software company Palantir Technologies to more quickly detect mortgage fraud as it pushes to exit a federal conservatorship and go private. 

Fannie Mae’s Crime Detection Unit will use AI-enabled technology to monitor millions of datasets and detect patterns indicative of fraud at a “speed and precision never before seen in the U.S. housing market,” the quasi-governmental lending firm said in a press release.

The program's use will start with its multifamily lending business, CNBC reported.

Early tests showed the AI technology requires just seconds to identify the kind of information human investigators took two months to uncover, Fannie Mae CEO Priscilla Almodovar said at a press event covered by the news outlet.

The partnership announcement comes after Fannie Mae in February set aside $752M for credit losses in its multifamily operations amid a fraud investigation. 

In April, Fannie Mae fired more than 100 employees, citing unethical conduct and the facilitation of fraud. 

“In President Trump’s housing market, there is no room for fraud, mortgage fraud, or any other deceitful act that can jeopardize the safety and soundness of the housing industry,” Fannie Mae Chairman Bill Pulte said in a statement. 

Trump has repeatedly shown interest in taking Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac private, boosting both agencies’ stocks Wednesday when he said they would still have government backing. The president is weighing an executive order to explore privatization.

Trump began the process of bringing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac out of the conservatorship of the Federal Housing Finance Agency in his first term, a measure that was stalled by the pandemic. The two entities have sat under the FHFA umbrella since the 2008 financial crisis, but the Treasury Department began unwinding its oversight of the agencies in January, even before Trump was sworn in. 

Fannie Mae is open to using the Palantir program to improve its efficiency outside of fraud detection, and it may be expanded to Freddie Mac in the future, said Pulte, who is also Freddie Mac chairman and director of the FHFA.

“The sky’s the limit,” Pulte said, according to CNBC. “We’re not just limited to fraud. If there are ways to pull cost out of the system, we want to do it.”

Palantir programs are also being used to modernize the U.S. military and cut costs in government, a priority for the Trump administration. The software company’s stock has risen more than 140% since Trump’s win in November.