Year-End Mortgage Application Levels Fizzled

It appears that few people were shopping for home loans during the Christmas season. According to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending Dec. 30, 2016, the Market Composite Index decreased 12 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from two weeks earlier while the unadjusted index plummeted by 48 percent.

The MBA also reported that the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased two percent from two weeks earlier while the unadjusted index collapsed by 41 percent compared with two weeks ago and was one percent lower than the same week one year ago. The Refinance Index took a 22 percent dive from two weeks ago.

In measuring data on a weekly basis, the MBA found that the refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 52.2 percent of total applications from 51.8 percent the previous week. Among the federal home loan programs, the FHA share of total applications increased to 11.6 percent from 10.7 percent the week prior while the USDA share of total applications increased to 1.1 percent from one percent, but the VA share of total applications dipped slightly to 12.3 percent from 12.4 percent one week earlier.