Mortgage Applications Increase in Latest MBA Weekly Survey



The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending May 15, 2009. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 915.9, an increase of 2.3 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 895.6 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 2.0 percent compared with the previous week and increased 42.0 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

The Refinance Index increased 4.5 percent to 4794.4 from 4588.6 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 4.4 percent to 254.0 from 265.7 one week earlier.

The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 6.4 percent. The four week moving average is up 0.1 percent for the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index, while this average is down 8.2 percent for the Refinance Index.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 73.6 percent of total applications from 71.9 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity increased to 2.4 percent from 2.3 percent of total applications from the previous week.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 4.69 percent from 4.76 percent, with points decreasing to 1.13 from 1.18 (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 4.44 percent from 4.50 percent, with points decreasing to 1.01 from 1.08 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 6.38 percent from 6.41 percent, with points decreasing to 0.10 from 0.11 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

**SPECIAL NOTES**

The survey covers approximately 50 percent of all U.S. retail residential mortgage applications, 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.