The volume of new policies written at Radian Guaranty Inc. fell to the worst level in eight months, but the delinquency rate was the lowest it’s been in nearly six years.
The volume of new mortgage insurance written by Radian during October was $3.5 billion, according to quarterly earnings data.
It was the slowest month since February, when $3.29 billion in home loans were insured.
New business declined from $3.83 billion the previous month and has been down for three consecutive months.
Activity also moved lower compared to the same month in 2012, when the Philadelphia-based company insured $4.01 billion in residential loans.
During the first 10 months of 2013, new business amounted to approximately $41.64 billion.
Radian, which reported that its policies in force stood at $158.610 billion as of the end of the third quarter, indicated that the number of delinquent policies fell 2 percent last month.
That put the number of delinquent policies at around 63,934, fewer than 65,239 as of Sept. 30. There were 93,930 delinquent policies as of Oct. 31, 2012.
Using an estimated 841,136 outstanding policies as of Oct. 31, 2013, the delinquency rate was an estimated 7.60 percent, improving from 7.84 percent a month earlier.
A year earlier, the revised estimated delinquency rate was 12.36 percent.
The latest delinquency rate was the lowest since the fourth-quarter 2007, when the rate was 6.80 percent.
