Mortgage Applications Decrease In Latest MBA Weekly Survey

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending September 21, 2007.  The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 654.2, a decrease of 2.8 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 673.2 one week earlier.  On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 3.3 percent compared with the previous week and was up 15.4 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

The seasonally adjusted Refinance Index increased 3.3 percent to 2026.5 from 1962.0 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 7.3 percent to 418.8 from 452.0 one week earlier.  On an unadjusted basis, the Purchase Index decreased 8.3 percent to 402.3 from 438.9 the previous week.  The seasonally adjusted Conventional Index decreased 3.2 percent to 937.2 from 968.2 the previous week, and the seasonally adjusted Government Index increased 0.6 percent to 182.3 from 181.2 the previous week.

The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is up 1.5 percent to 651.9 from 642.2.  The four week moving average is down 0.3 percent to 436.2 from 437.4 for the Purchase Index, while this average is up 4.0 percent to 1908.8 from 1834.6 for the Refinance Index.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 46.4 percent of total applications from 43.5 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 12.2 from 12.6 percent of total applications from the previous week.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.38 percent from 6.29 percent, with points increasing to 1.15 from 1.02 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value (LTV) ratio loans.

The average contract interest rate for 15-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.06 from 5.99 percent, with points increasing to 1.12 from 1.09 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 6.09 from 6.39 percent, with points decreasing to 0.93 from 0.95 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

**SPECIAL NOTES**

The survey covers approximately 50 percent of all U.S. retail residential mortgage originations, and has been conducted weekly since 1990.  Respondents include mortgage bankers, commercial banks and thrifts.  Base period and value for all indexes is March 16, 1990=100.

 John Mechem                      Carolyn Kemp
(202) 557-2924                  (202) 557-2727
jmechem@mortgagebankers.org      ckemp@mortgagebankers.org