Purchase Application Volume Remains High As 2004 Nears End

December 29, 2004

WASHINGTON, D.C. (December 29, 2004)— The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending December 24. The Market Composite Index - a measure of mortgage loan application volume - was 677.4, a decrease of 1.7 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 689.3 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 31.7 percent compared with last week but was up 36.6 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

During the Christmas-shortened week, the MBA seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased by 2.7 percent to 483.8 from 471.1 the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Refinance Index decreased by 7.9 percent to 1803.9 from 1958.2 one week earlier.

On an unadjusted basis, the Purchase Index is up 45.0 percent and the ARM Index is up 51.4 percent compared with the holiday week one year ago.

Other seasonally adjusted index activity included the Conventional Index, which decreased 2.4 percent to 1006.7 from 1031.1 the previous week. The Government Index increased 7.7 percent to 127.8 from 118.7 the previous week.

The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 46.2 percent of total applications from 48.9 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 33.8 percent from 34.4 percent of total applications.

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.72 percent from 5.69 percent one week earlier, with points decreasing to 1.33 from 1.39 the previous week (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 5.12 percent from 5.11 percent one week earlier, with points increasing to 1.32 from 1.28 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs decreased to 4.05 percent from 4.15 percent one week earlier, with points remaining at 0.98 (including the origination fee) for 80 percent LTV loans.

Source: MBA


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