Debt-to-income limits by loan type
Debt-to-income is a ratio lenders use. The cutoff depends on who is insuring or buying the loan, and a calculator cannot approve one.
A debt-to-income ratio compares what a household pays each month with what it earns before taxes. Lenders use it because the payment on the new loan has to fit next to the debts the household already has. There is no single national cutoff. Fannie Mae, the Federal Housing Administration, and the Department of Veterans Affairs publish different tests. The debt-to-income calculator computes the ratios from the numbers you type. The limits below are the ones those agencies publish. They are not a decision on any application.
Two ratios, not one
The front-end ratio is the housing payment divided by gross monthly income. Housing, for this purpose, is the full payment: principal, interest, property tax, insurance, and mortgage insurance or association dues when they apply. People abbreviate that payment as PITI, and add the other items when the lender counts them.
The back-end ratio adds the other monthly debts: car loans, student loans, credit-card minimums, and support payments the lender counts. It is total monthly debts, including housing, divided by the same gross income. A household can pass one ratio and miss the other. The back-end ratio is the one most program rules talk about. The front-end ratio still shows whether the house itself is the tight part.
Gross income is pay before taxes. Take-home pay is lower. A ratio that meets a program rule can still feel tight on the amount that reaches the bank account. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s explanation of the ratio is the plain-language source for the definition. The program handbooks are the source for the cutoffs.
Fannie Mae
Fannie Mae’s Selling Guide, section B3-6-02, is the conventional rule most often quoted. For loans underwritten by hand, the maximum total debt-to-income ratio is 36 percent of stable monthly income. The guide allows that maximum to go as high as 45 percent when the borrower meets the credit-score and reserve requirements in Fannie Mae’s Eligibility Matrix.
For loan files underwritten by Desktop Underwriter, Fannie Mae’s published maximum is 50 percent. Cash-out refinances and some other transactions can have a tighter cap. The guide says government loans follow the government agency’s rules instead. A lender may calculate a debt more conservatively than Fannie Mae does, if it does so consistently. A ratio under 50 percent is not an approval. Desktop Underwriter reads the whole file.
FHA
FHA insures the loan. Lenders underwrite it to HUD Handbook 4000.1. Manual FHA underwriting uses a housing-ratio benchmark and a total-debt benchmark, often discussed as 31 percent and 43 percent. HUD allows higher ratios when the file meets the compensating-factor rules in the handbook, and FHA’s automated underwriting can accept a ratio the manual benchmarks would not. Those are eligibility tests for mortgage insurance, not a promise that a payment is comfortable.
The FHA loan amount also has to fit the county limit. That is a separate rule, covered in FHA loan limits in 2026. A ratio inside the handbook’s range does not raise the county limit.
VA
VA-guaranteed loans are underwritten with residual income as a central test: the money left after the housing payment, other debts, and an estimated cost of living. A single back-end percentage is not the whole VA rule the way Fannie Mae’s 36, 45, and 50 percent figures are. VA’s lender handbook is the document that sets the residual-income tables and how debt-to-income is considered alongside them. This page does not reprint those tables. A VA loan can look acceptable on a generic 43 percent comparison and still fail residual income, or the reverse.
The funding fee, if it is financed, raises the loan amount and can raise the payment that goes into the ratio. An exempt borrower does not add that fee. See who is exempt from the VA funding fee.
Worked example
A household earns $96,000 a year. The housing payment they are testing is $2,200 a month. Other debts are a $400 car payment, $400 in student loans, and a $200 card minimum. The debt-to-income calculator produces these ratios. The 31 and 43 percent targets are typed in so the page can show the room under the manual FHA benchmarks. They are not the household’s only possible limits.
- Gross monthly income: $96,000 ÷ 12 = $8,000.
- Front-end: $2,200 ÷ $8,000 = 27.5%. Against a 31% target, the room is $280 a month.
- Other debts: $400 + $400 + $200 = $1,000. Total payments: $3,200.
- Back-end: $3,200 ÷ $8,000 = 40.0%. Against a 43% target, the room is $240 a month.
On these inputs the front-end ratio is inside a 31 percent benchmark and the back-end ratio is inside a 43 percent benchmark. The same back-end ratio is above Fannie Mae’s 36 percent manual cap and below the 45 percent manual cap that requires the credit-score and reserve rules in the Eligibility Matrix. It is below the 50 percent Desktop Underwriter maximum. None of those comparisons is an underwriting decision. The affordability calculator runs the question the other way: given income, debts, and the ratios you set, what price still fits.
What a ratio leaves out
The ratio does not know tax withholding, childcare, or a car that is about to be paid off unless that payment is removed from the debts. It does not know whether the income is stable. It does not know the interest rate. You type the housing payment, which already reflects whatever rate and term you assumed. Changing the rate changes the payment, and the payment changes the ratio. The ratio pages on this site do not fetch a market rate.