After making adjustments for the recent holiday, new applications for home loans slowed last week. Out front of the decline were purchase-money mortgage applications.
In the week ended Oct. 20, the Market Composite Index — a measure of
retail residential loan application volume — fell a seasonally adjusted 5 percent from a week prior.
But without making any seasonal adjustments, the index jumped 6 percent from the seven-day period that included the Columbus Day holiday.
Application data were derived from the
Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey reported Wednesday by the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Refinance activity was off 3 percent from the week ended Oct. 13.
At 49.5 percent, refinance share was wider than 48.6 percent in the last report. The share was slashed, though, from the same seven days in 2016, when refinance share was 62.7 percent.
MBA reported that applications for loans to finance a home purchase
retreated a seasonally adjusted 6 percent. However, the unadjusted Purchase Index climbed 4 percent from the preceding report and has risen by a tenth compared to the week ended Oct. 21, 2016.
Applications for loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration made up 9.8 percent of total activity. FHA share was cut from 10.4 percent during the holiday week and 11.1 percent the same week last year.
Also thinning were was the share of applications for Department of Veterans Affairs-guaranteed mortgages, to 10.1 percent from 10.5 percent. VA share was 12.2 percent twelve months earlier.
Out of all borrowers who applied for mortgage, 6.4 percent applied for an adjustable-rate mortgage. ARM share widened from 6.1 percent a week earlier and 4.2 percent a year earlier.
Interest rates on jumbo mortgages were 7 basis points lower than conforming rates in the latest report. Jumbo rates were
just a single basis point less than conforming rates in last week’s report, and there was no difference the same week last year.
