Washington, DC, August 2, 2006--The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending July 28. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 527.6, a decrease of 1.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 533.8 one week earlier.
This is the lowest that the index has been since May 2002. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 1.4 percent compared with the previous week but was down 29.0 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.
The seasonally-adjusted Purchase Index decreased by 3.3 percent to 376.2 from 389.0 the previous week and the Refinance Index increased by 2.3 percent to 1417.2 from 1385.2 one week earlier. The Purchase Index is at its lowest since November 2003. Other seasonally adjusted index activity includes the Conventional Index, which decreased 1.3 percent to 777.5 from 788.0 the previous week, and the Government Index, which increased 0.9 percent to 110.9 from 109.9 the previous week.
The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 1.5 percent to 542.3 from 550.6. The four week moving average is down 2.3 percent to 397.2 from 406.7 for the Purchase Index, while this average is down 0.1 percent to 1395.1 from 1396.8 for the Refinance Index.
The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 37.0 percent of total applications from 35.6 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 27.8 percent of total applications from 28.6 percent the previous week. The ARM share is at its lowest since March 2004.
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 6.62 percent from 6.69 percent, with points decreasing to 1.00 from 1.07 (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 6.28 percent from 6.31 percent, with points decreasing to 1.00 from 1.07 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 6.18 percent from 6.25 percent, with points decreasing to 0.81 from 0.83 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
