Washington, DC, January 3, 2007--The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending December 29. This week’s results include an adjustment to account for the Christmas holiday.
The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 575.6, an increase of 3.6 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 555.8 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 27.4 percent compared with the previous week and was up 6.9 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.
The Refinance Index increased by 2.2 percent to 1640.4 from 1604.6 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased by 4.3 percent to 406.9 from 390.2 one week earlier. The seasonally adjusted Conventional Index increased by 3.8 percent to 857.3 from 826.1 the previous week, and the seasonally adjusted Government Index increased 0.7 percent to 106.1 from 105.4 the previous week.
The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 2.8 percent to 625.1 from 643.1. The four week moving average is down 1.1 percent to 424.4 from 429.3 for the Purchase Index, while this average is down 4.4 percent to 1879.6 from 1966.9 for the Refinance Index.
The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 48.1 percent of total applications from 48.8 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 20.4 from 23.1 percent of total applications from the previous week. The ARM share is at its lowest level since July 2003.
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.22 from 6.12 percent, with points decreasing to 0.92 from 0.96 (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 5.93 percent from 5.84 percent, with points decreasing to 1 from 1.06 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 5.84 percent from 5.87, with points increasing to 0.83 from 0.80 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
