The quarterly origination of first mortgages, home-equity loans and home-equity lines of credit has ascended to multi-year highs.
From Jan. 1 through March 31 of this year, there were 1.86 million first mortgages originated for a total amount of $450.5 billion.
The dollar volume of first-mortgage production turned out to be the highest first-quarter total since the
first-three months of 2013.
Those details and more were discussed in the US National Consumer Credit Trends Report: Originations from Equifax.
First-mortgage production climbed from a downwardly revised 1.69 million loans for $401.1 billion during the first-quarter 2015.
The subprime portion of first-quarter 2016 loan originations was 95,200 loans for $16.2 billion, up from 75,100 loans for $11.7 billion in the same period last year.
“Similarly, the latest data shows that lending to borrowers with subprime credit scores (consumers with an Equifax Risk Score of 620 or below) — as a share of total lending — has remained consistent for the third consecutive year,” the report stated. “New first mortgage accounts to subprime borrowers during Q1 of 2015-2016 have increased on a consistent basis alongside that of prime lending, with approximately 95 percent accounting for prime loans and 5 percent accounting for subprime loans.”
HEL originations totaled 182,400 units for $5.87 billion during the first-three months of this year.
The number of HELs originated was the highest
of any first quarter than during any of the most-recent eight years.
In the first-quarter 2015, HEL production came to an upwardly revised
147,700 units for $5.14 billion.
Subprime first-quarter 2016 HEL volume was 20,830 loans for $0.455 billion, more than the 16,540 subprime HELs for $0.355 billion one year previous.
“The average loan amount on new subprime home-equity installment loans increased 9.6 percent from Q1 2015-2016, while in that same time the average loan amount on all home-equity installment loans increased 1.7 percent,” Equifax said.
In addition, there were 314,400 new HELOCs
opened during the most-recent period with credit limits of $35.15 billion.
HELOC activity was the strongest it’s been in eight years.
HELOC production
rose from a downwardly revised 285,400 lines with credit limits of $30.84 billion opened in the first-quarter 2015.
The subprime portion of HELOC production was 4,700 lines for $0.170 billion,
more than 4,430 lines for $0.153 billion in the first-three months of last year.
“The first quarter of 2016 was a strong one for mortgage lending and underwriting practices appear to have maintained their rigor over the last three years,” Equifax Chief Economist Amy Crews Cutts said in the report. “We anticipate that the second quarter of 2016 will maintain this trend. And later this year, the much-anticipated addition of trended credit data to the mortgage underwriting process will help to strengthen the marketplace further by helping to statistically separate lower risk borrowers from those presenting higher risk.”
