Over the last decade or so, the credit score has really become the absolute criteria used for lending decisions. There was a time that banks looked at your credit report as a whole and an individual made a decision about your credit worthiness. This time has long since passed and now the numbers are simply fed into a computer and the decision is made.
However, there are some banks that can override the electronic system and even ignore the credit score altogether. These banks are becoming rarer as it is much cheaper not to have traditional loan officers on the payroll. However, the banks also realize that there are some perfectly valid explanations why someone could have a poor credit score, but be an excellent credit risk.
An example of this is a health issue, loss of job, or debt that you did not know about. I recently worked with a client that made a mistake on their taxes over 7 years ago. The IRS had the wrong address for him and eventually they put a tax lien on a relatively small amount of money. As soon as the tax lien was issued, the customer learned about it on his credit score and quickly paid for it. Unfortunately, tax liens are nearly impossible to have removed from a credit report. My client had excellent credit before the tax lien, and excellent credit since. However, the lien dropped his credit score by over 150 points!
If he was to apply for a mortgage, credit card or even a car loan he would not have a hard time getting approved. Even if he was approved, the interest rates would be out of line for someone that has such a good history. This particular client used my services to find banks that will work with him and overlook the single issue. This route was cheaper than going after the tax lien directly in court and in the grand scheme of things he is still able to get the loans he requires.
The point of the story is that sometimes you can end up with a bad credit score that is not entirely your fault. When this happens the key is to either fight to have the bad items removed, or research banks and other lenders that have the ability to look past credit scores when they make their credit decisions.