by Calculated Risk on 4/18/2007 11:11:00 AM

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reports: Purchase Applications Rise, Refinance Applications Decline in Latest MBA Survey

The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 630.6, a decrease of 2.5 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 646.6 one week earlier. On an unadjusted basis, the Index decreased 2.2 percent compared with the previous week and was up 9.9 percent compared with the same week one year earlier.

"Since the survey covered the week after the Easter weekend, it is likely that home sales were a little lower, and thus, possibly impacted purchase applications last week.” said Vincent Varma, Director of Industry Surveys at the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The Refinance Index decreased 0.3 percent to 2008.4 from 2015 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 4.2 percent to 396.5 from 413.8 one week earlier.

Mortgage rates increased:

The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.22 percent from 6.16 percent ...

The average contract interest rate for one-year ARMs increased to 5.89 from 5.88 percent ...

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the Purchase Index and the 4 and 12 week moving averages since January 2002. For the Purchase Index, the four week moving average is down 0.9 percent to 406.1 from 409.6.

The refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 43.6 percent of total applications from 42.8 percent the previous week. The adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 18.1 from 18.7 percent of total applications from the previous week.