The two new credit cards almost certainly were not the real cause. With a 700 score, the likelier culprit is the debt-to-income ratio on the exact scenario submitted. The automated underwriting engines are essentially a black box, and they decline the specific scenario, never you as a borrower. Change the inputs and the same file can come back approved. The debt ratio tied to the purchase price entered is the usual suspect. The approach that works: a loan officer who runs both major engines and methodically adjusts the variables to find what the system objects to, rather than guessing at one cause and giving up. The levers include: - The purchase price and loan amount. - The reserves shown on the application. - How the debts are structured. Often a small change to the price point, or documenting additional reserves, flips the result. Two files with the same borrower can get different answers purely from how the scenario is built. Rather than reapply blindly, have someone test-drive the file through the systems and tune it. That kind of scenario testing is exactly what we do on the free Roadmap conversation.