Mortgage Applications Increase Slightly In Latest MBA Weekly Survey


The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending October 3, 2008. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 465.5, an increase of 2.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 455.4 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 2.2 percent compared with the previous week and was down 28.6 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

The Refinance Index increased 0.9 percent to 1345.8 from the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 3.2 percent to 314.5 from one week earlier. The Conventional Purchase Index increased 0.7 percent while the Government Purchase Index (largely FHA) increased 9.9 percent.

The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 1.4 percent. The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index is down 4.1 percent, while this average is up 1.8 percent for the Refinance Index.

The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 43.4 percent of total applications from 44.0 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 2.3 percent from 2.5 percent of total applications from the previous week.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.99 percent from 6.07 percent, with points decreasing to 1.09 from 1.12 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent loan-to-value (LTV) ratio loans.

The average contract interest rate for 15-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.71 percent from 5.82 percent, with points increasing to 1.16 from 1.11 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs remained unchanged at 6.60 percent, with points increasing to 0.37 from 0.33 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

Note: Data for government applications were revised from the first week of June, 2008 through the last week of September 2008. As a result, some historical series were revised.