A jumbo mortgage is a home loan with an amount higher than the maximum loan limit eligible for purchase by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Home loans that fall within the ceiling of the stipulated limits are called conforming mortgages.

While those that exceed the limits are jumbo mortgages as the perception is that these loan sizes are considered large.

In a bid to get around these limits, borrowers sometimes use strategies like a piggyback mortgage in order to qualify for conforming eligibility.

The reason being that jumbos come with higher interest rates and points.

However, as a response to the crisis of 2008, limits for certain counties were raised exponentially to encourage consumer spending.

These huge loans in selected high-cost counties that were higher than the typical limits but still eligible to be purchased by the two federal agencies are called conforming jumbos.