The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was started many decades ago and is a division under the HUD (Housing and Urban Developement)

It was developed to help first time home buyers with less than perfect credit and not much down payment (about 3%), much of which can come from gifts from family and/or home buyer down payment assistance companies.  The seller, real estate agent, or lender can even help by contributing up to 6% of the value of the property towards closing costs.