The Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) latest Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey—a measure of loan origination activity—shows a drop in mortgage application volume for the week ending May 23, 2008.
The survey’s Market Composite Index, which measures the weekly volume, hovered at 593.3—a 4.6-percent drop on a seasonally-adjusted basis from 621.6 a week earlier. The MBA says “on an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 4.6-percent compared with the previous week and was down 7.5-percent compared with the same week one year earlier.”

The number of mortgage loans facing refinancing also dropped last week. The MBA says, “The Refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 46.1-percent of total applications from 48.2-percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 9.3 from 10.0-percent of total applications from the previous week.”
Here is more data from the survey:
Refinance Index: dropped 8.9-percent to 2013.5 from 2210.5 the previous week
Seasonally-adjusted Purchase Index: increased 0.1-percent to 352.7 from 352.5 a week earlier
Conventional Purchase Index: increased 0.8-percent
Government Purchase Index: decreased 2.2-percent
Conventional Purchase Index (unadjusted basis): increased 0.1-percent to 517.7 from 517.0
Four-week moving average for the seasonally-adjusted Market Index—Increased one-percent to 636.2 from 629.6.
Four-week moving average for the Purchase Index up 0.9-percent to 366.2 from 363.1
Average Interest Rate: 30-year fixed-rate mortgages – increased from 5.90-percent to 5.96-percent
Average Contract Interest Rate: 15-year fixed-rate mortgages – jumped from 5.42-percent to 5.49-percent
One-year ARMs: increased from 6.71-percent to 6.92-percent