Survey: Refis Increase to 73% of Mortgage Activity

RISMEDIA, Jan. 31, 2008-The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending January 25, 2008. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 1054.9, an increase of 7.5% on a seasonally adjusted basis from 981.5 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index increased 10.5% compared with the previous week and was up 70.7% compared with the same week one year earlier.

The Refinance Index increased 22.1% to 5103.6 from 4178.2 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 17.7% to 362.0 from 439.9 one week earlier. The Conventional Purchase Index decreased 18.9% while the Government Purchase Index (largely FHA) decreased 10.0%. On an unadjusted basis, the Purchase Index decreased 12.3% to 324.4 from 369.7 the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Conventional Index increased 8.8% to 1537.6 from 1413.7 the previous week, and the seasonally adjusted Government Index decreased 4.1% to 250.2 from 260.9 the previous week.

The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is up 16.7% to 912.2 from 782.0. The four week moving average is up 0.1% to 419.3 from 419.0 for the Purchase Index, while this average is up 29.3% to 3837.9 from 2967.2 for the Refinance Index.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 73.0% of total applications from 66.0% the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 8.6 from 9.3% of total applications from the previous week.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.60% from 5.49%, with points decreasing to 1.06 from 1.07 (including the origination fee) for 80% loan-to-value (LTV) ratio loans.

The average contract interest rate for 15-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.04% from 4.96%, with points decreasing to 1.12 from 1.22 (including the origination fee) for 80% LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs increased to 5.70% from 5.51%, with points decreasing to 0.97 from 1.01 (including the origination fee) for 80% LTV loans.

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