Applications drive weekly increase as one form of activity remains low
Mortgage applications went up for the week ending November 11, with the Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) weekly mortgage applications survey reporting a 3.8% increase in volume levels.
MBA’s market composite index, which measures mortgage loan application volume, climbed 2.7% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. Unadjusted, the index registered a 10% decrease compared with the previous week.
“Mortgage rates decreased last week as signs of slower inflation pushed Treasury yields lower,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s vice president and deputy chief economist. “The 30-year fixed rate saw the largest single-week decline since July 2022, dropping to 6.9%. Application activity, adjusted to account for the Veterans Day holiday, increased in response to the drop in rates.”
According to Kan, this increase in application activity was driven by a rise in home purchase applications, with the MBA’s seasonally adjusted purchase index seeing a 4% jump from one week earlier. Unadjusted, this came out as a 10% decrease and was 46% lower than the same period last year.
Purchase applications also increased for all loan types, added Kan, with the average purchase loan falling to its smallest amount since 2021.
Meanwhile, refinancing and prepayment activity remained down, with MBA’s refinance index falling 2% from the previous week and 88% below the same time last year.
“There is very little refinance incentive with rates so much higher than last year,” said Kan.
The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 27.6% from 28.1% the previous week, while the adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity fell to 10.6% of total applications. The FHA share of total applications increased to 13.5% from 13.3% the week prior and the VA share of total applications increased to 10.6% from 10.3%. The USDA share of total applications increased to 0.6% from 0.5% week over week.
