by Calculated Risk on 7/01/2009 08:11:00 AM

The MBA reports:

The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, was 444.8, a decrease of 18.9 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from 548.2 one week earlier.
...
The Refinance Index decreased 30.0 percent to 1482.2 from 2116.3 the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 4.5 percent to 267.7 from 280.3 one week earlier. The Refinance Index is at its lowest level since November 2008.
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The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.34 percent from 5.44 percent ...

Click on graph for larger image in new window.

This graph shows the MBA Purchase Index and four week moving average since 2002.

Note: The increase in 2007 was due to the method used to construct the index.

The Purchase index is still near recent lows, but the big story this week was the sharp decline in the Refinance index - probably because of the recent rise in borrowing costs.