Asset and Income Modeler (AIM) FAQ

AIM for employment offers Sellers representation and warranty relief eligibility for the borrower’s current employment. Employment representation and warranty relief also satisfies the verification of current employment documentation requirement of Guide Section 5302.2 (i.e., 10-day pre-closing verification).

Income data from payroll reports and asset reports, including employment-only reports (e.g. VOE using payroll or asset data) can be used. In addition, data from digitized paystubs and W-2s is also eligible.

You’ll need to ensure that the loan closes by the close-by date on the LPA feedback certificate and retain the verification report or paystub in the loan file (if using digitized paystubs and W-2s).

The close-by date is calculated by AIM (Report Date + 14 calendar days). To get the Report Date, AIM will use the following for the different data sources:

• Payroll reports: Report Date or Pay Period End Date
• Asset reports: Asset as of Date
• Digitized paystubs: Paystub check date or Pay Period End Date

Refreshing an income or asset verification report to get an updated close-by date may impact the employment and income representation and warranty eligibility result, as income or assets will be reassessed upon resubmission to LPA.

Leveraging an employment-only verification report (e.g., VOE using payroll or asset data) will produce a new close-by date without impacting the income representation and warranty relief eligibility.

When using digitized paystubs and W-2s as the data source, you can submit a more recent paystub to AIM Check API and resubmit to LPA if the close-by date has passed. However, income will be reassessed upon resubmission to LPA.

For existing AIM users, you’ll begin to receive employment representation and warranty relief eligibility messaging beginning with submissions or resubmissions on October 13. There are no additional integrations needed.

For potential AIM users, you can contact an AIM service provider to begin ordering asset or payroll reports (including employment-only reports) and submit to LPA, or inquire about our digitized paystub and W-2 capability.

No. AIM Check for Employment API can only be used to satisfy the verification of current employment documentation requirement of Guide Section 5302.2 (i.e., 10 day pre-closing verification).

To find more information on AIM for employment, please refer to the AIM Releases & Resources webpage.

Integrations with AIM Check API and Loan Product Advisor® (LPA^SM) are required (all active LPA specifications support this offering).

Freddie Mac-approved Sellers and verified service providers should contact their Freddie Mac representative to learn more about integrating with the API.

Data must be extracted from the borrower’s paystub and W-2 using your own optical character recognition (OCR) technology or a vendor-supplied technology. The data and report ID must then be submitted to AIM Check API to get a preliminary view of the income calculation. Submit the report ID used in the API to LPA to have AIM assess the previously submitted data and provide the income calculation. Your results will be provided through the LPA feedback certificate with representation and warranty relief eligibility where available.

Not at this time.

Since you can use your own or a vendor-supplied OCR technology to digitize the paystubs and W-2s obtained from the borrower (versus an approved AIM service provider), representation and warranty relief is only offered for the calculation of the income.

No, but the paystubs and W-2s must be retained in the mortgage file.

Yes.

Closed LPA loans with digitized paystub and W-2 data are eligible.

Borrower name, social security number, LP Key and closing date are required.

Yes.

No. The certificate is returned only when the loan is eligible for income R&W relief. If not eligible, the response JSON file will contain exception messaging.

Sellers should follow the normal AIM approval process to use digitized paystubs and W-2s through AIM Check API and then would be subject to an additional approval for the closed loan (or post-closing) functionality. Guide requirements can be found in Chapter 5901. Sellers should contact their Freddie Mac representative or call 800-FREDDIE for more details and to request Freddie Mac’s approval to submit closed loan data to the API.

AIM for income using tax data from tax returns provided by the borrower simplifies the income calculation process by using optical character recognition (OCR) technology to read and organize these documents, while significantly reducing transcription errors. AIM performs an income assessment using this data and messages results back on the Loan Product Advisor^® (LPA^SM) Feedback Certificate.

When tax transcripts are obtained from a service provider with a direct IRS connection, AIM for income using tax data automates the income calculation of the borrower’s income reported on Schedule C. AIM then performs an income assessment. It then messages back the results on the Loan Product Advisor Feedback Certificate. The Seller may be eligible for certain representations and warranties related to income calculation and accuracy and integrity of the data.

Loan Product Advisor specification v5.0.06 (or greater).

Note: Loan Product Advisor specification v5.0.06 and v5.1.00 will be retired in March 2024.

Loan Product Advisor will only assess the income for the borrower on the loan.

Loan Product Advisor’s income calculations are based on the Schedule Analysis Method from Freddie Mac Form 91. However, Loan Product Advisor also considers other factors in its assessment, including stability, historical trends and consistency.

Note: If a business is excluded from the Income Calculation Report (e.g., recently closed business), Loan Product Advisor will exclude the income from that business.

After you make the manual correction in the Income Calculation Report, upload the updated report to the service provider and resubmit the loan with the same report ID to Loan Product Advisor.

If you notice errors of this kind, please report them to the service provider support team.

Yes. In Loan Product Advisor, you must select the self-employed indicator and include the unique reference number (report ID) assigned by the service provider, which should be shown either on the Income Calculation Report or the tax transcript. For more details, see the AIM for income using tax data job aid.

Loan Product Advisor only accepts one report ID for the loan. The report ID relates to only one Form 1040 for each applicable calendar year and may be associated with up to two borrowers if they filed jointly.

Only one tax report ID will be assessed, so it is important to only submit the one you want to use.

If you access Loan Product Advisor through system-to-system (S2S) integration, submitting more than one will not cause a hard stop on the entire loan. However, only the first report ID that you entered in the system will be assessed.

If you access Loan Product Advisor via the portal, you will receive a popup error if you attempt to submit the loan with two report IDs. Clicking “OK” in the popup error will clear the report ID field. You should add only the specific report ID that you want to be assessed to the field and resubmit.

If using borrower-provided tax returns and the borrower used different business names on the Schedule C in different years, the service provider will treat them as two different businesses. This means that it will appear as if there is only one year of tax returns for each of those businesses when submitting to Loan Product Advisor.

If this happens and the different names reported on the Schedule C are for the same business, you may contact the service provider support team to request reprocessing of the tax returns as one business. After reprocessing, you must resubmit to Loan Product Advisor.

This option is not available when using tax transcripts.

Yes.

AIM now includes an assessment of rental income as reported on the borrower’s individual tax returns. The assessment includes an automated analysis to determine if the submitted monthly income amount for each property is supported, based on the Schedule E of the tax return. Please note that rental income-related feedback messages are for informational purposes only. Currently, rental income is not eligible for representation and warranty relief.

If you use AIM for income using tax data and rental income is submitted in Loan Product Advisor, feedback messages related to the assessment of rental income will automatically be returned.

This enhancement is currently supported by LoanLogics^® (LoanBeam^® product).

No. However, to participate you will need an appropriate contract in place with a designated third-party service provider for this enhancement. You remain responsible for conducting your own due diligence of any such provider to ensure it meets your company’s needs and requirements.