STAMFORD, Conn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--VantageScore Solutions, LLC, the company behind the VantageScore® credit scoring model, announced today the results of dual surveys of lenders and consumers about their understanding of the population of consumers that cannot be scored when lenders use traditional credit scoring methodologies. These consumers are deemed the “credit invisibles.”

Among other findings, the survey found that half (51 percent) of consumers and 61 percent of lenders estimate the number of unscoreable consumers to be less than 25 million – significantly below the actual figure of approximately 35 million. Lenders also said that they view these consumers as an opportunity for their institution and not an additional risk or cost.

“Clearly a lack of a credit score can be an impediment to obtaining mainstream credit, and the findings of this survey indicate that while lenders see the ‘credit invisibles’ as an opportunity, they underestimate the number of consumers that make up this population. It is very important for lenders to understand these consumers’ risk profiles so that they can effectively extend credit safely and soundly in accordance with their lending strategies,” said Barrett Burns, president & CEO of VantageScore Solutions.

Lenders are obviously not the only ones affected by the credit invisibles. Consumers also are worried that they are credit invisible. In fact, the survey showed that 69 percent of consumers are concerned that they or someone they know will be unable to receive a credit score. This alarming statistic is depicted with an infographic which is available on VantageScore Solutions’ website.

Previous research by VantageScore Solutions uncovered the risk profile and demographic make-up of the credit invisibles and found that among the 30-35 million consumers typically not scored by conventional models, 10 million of these consumers have scores of 600 and above.

The VantageScore research also found that the risk levels of the new scoring consumers are aligned with consumers exhibiting conventional credit management behaviors and from a fair lending perspective, 9.5 million of the newly scored consumers are African-American or Hispanic, of whom 2.7 million have credit scores above 600.

About VantageScore Solutions

VantageScore Solutions, LLC (www.vantagescore.com) is the independently managed company that owns the intellectual property rights to the VantageScore credit scoring models, including the VantageScore 3.0 model which provides up to 25 percent predictive improvement over earlier models and has the ability to formulate a score for 30 – 35 million previously unscoreable consumers. Initially developed by America’s three national credit reporting companies (CRCs) — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — VantageScore Solutions’ highly predictive models use an innovative, patented and patent-pending tri-bureau scoring methodology that provides lenders and consumers with more consistent credit scores across all three national credit reporting companies.