A growing number of people were taking out mortgages last week, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).
The Market Composite Index, the MBA’s measure of mortgage loan application volume, was up by 14.2% on a seasonally adjusted basis on a week-over-week measurement. On an unadjusted basis, the index increased by 26%.
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 5% and the unadjusted index soared by 15%, although the latter was also 0.4% lower than the same week one year ago. The Refinance Index increased 24% and was 127% higher than the same week one year ago, while the refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 51.2% of total applications from 46.7% in the previous week.
Among the federal programs, the FHA share of total applications increased to 15.2% from 14.7% while the VA share of total applications increased to 16.8% from 16.4% and the USDA share of total applications remained unchanged at 0.4%.
The MBA also reported mortgage applications for new home purchases in August were up 4.4% year-over-year and were unchanged from July. The average loan size for new homes increased from $393,344 in July to $395,935 in August while conventional loans accounted for 59.7% of loan applications, FHA loans composed 29.6%.
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