From the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA):
Mortgage Application Volume Steady in Latest Survey
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending July 7. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 566.8, an increase of 1.0 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 561.0 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 29.1 percent compared with the previous week and was down 36.3 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.
The seasonally-adjusted Purchase Index increased by 2.6 percent to 425.0 from 414.2 the previous week and the Refinance Index decreased by 1.6 percent to 1400.5 from 1423.9 one week earlier. Other seasonally adjusted index activity includes the Conventional Index, which increased 1.2 percent to 837.3 from 827.2 the previous week, and the Government Index, which decreased 1.3 percent to 115.8 from 117.3 the previous week.
The four week moving average for the seasonally-adjusted Market Index is down 0.2 percent to 556.3 from 557.5. The four week moving average is up 0.6 percent to 410.8 from 408.2 for the Purchase Index, while this average is down 1.7 percent to 1411.6 from 1436.4 for the Refinance Index.
The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 34.0 percent of total applications from 35.0 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 28.7 percent of total applications from 29.5 percent the previous week.
Posting this up a bit later than usual. Unfortunately I was busy for most of the day. There was a dramatic decline in the unadjusted data for last week, however realize that it was a holiday/shortened week. But turning a 29.1% decline into a 1% increase? They must have brought out a sledge hammer to make an adjustment like that.
Caveat Emptor!
Grim
In all honesty, no reason to doubt the MBA numbers. Just pointing out an intersting analytical “quirk”.
grim
I just read “The Little Engine That Could” to my daughter.
Market feels like a little train going up a big mountain right now. Too bad we don’t know the grade on the other side.
Click: Some Homebuilders stocks hits Year-low today
Housing prices should follow downturn in home builders` stock price too !!!
Right, home prices should go along with Homebuilders` stock prices !!!
North Virginia Market
-28.8%, 4.6%, 2.1%, 40,000, 17,000, -22%, -485,000
Numbers. They’re just numbers. But each of the above numbers is critical to understanding the current real estate market in Northern Virginia and metro DC, and to understanding where this market is likely to be headed over the next several years.
North Virginia Market
As long as our job growth remains strong, our housing market is going to be just fine.
The problem is that once people look at the current prices of real estate in DC, they say no thanks to the job offers. The housing market isn’t fine because it prevents jobs from being filled. the prices scare away potential employees
I agree Grim, 1% increase seems strange. Maybe the previous week was just particularly bad. I don’t have the historic weekly numbers, but maybe an index of 566.8 is at or near the bottom. All I know is I don’t think there were more than 5 mortgage applications in NNJ last week. At least not near me.
How often do they update the factor they use to seasonally adjust the Index? Could they have used a “seasonally adjusted” factor that is outdated or fudged a little?
A side note of overall caution, ask any statistician and they’ll tell you numbers don’t lie, but you can spin the way a stat is shown to get the results you want. This can be done through using bar graphs vs. pie charts, looking at the data one way vs. another way.
Perhaps the July 4th holiday, caused the distortion in the number.
It was absolutely the holiday that caused the app index to drop so dramatically.
grim