RISMEDIA, October 29, 2009—The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending October 23, 2009. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 12.3% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 2.8% compared with the previous week, which included the Columbus Day holiday.
The Refinance Index decreased 16.2% from the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 5.2% from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index increased 4.8% compared with the previous week, which was a holiday shortened week, and was 15.4% lower than the same week one year ago.
The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is down 3.1%. The four week moving average is down 1.4% for the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index, while this average is down 4.1% for the Refinance Index.
The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 62.3% of total applications from 65.0% the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity increased to 6.9% from 6.4% of total applications from the previous week.
The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.04% from 5.07%, with points increasing to 1.25 from 1.13 (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 4.53% from 4.51%, with points decreasing to 0.78 from 0.96 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 6.79% from 6.86%, with points decreasing to 0.29 from 0.31 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.
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