Mortgage loan application volume plunged 28.7 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis for the week ending March 28, 2008 compared to a week earlier, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) said today.
On an unadjusted basis, the mortgage application index decreased 28.1 percent compared with the previous week and was up 4.8 percent compared with the same week a year ago.
The drop in mortgage applications was largely attributable to the 38.1 percent decrease in refinance applications, although purchase and Government purchase (FHA) loan volume also fell 11.8 percent each during the week.
The share of applications that were refinances fell to 53.4 percent of the total after surging to 62 percent last week.
Meanwhile, interest rates continued to worsen or show little improvement from a week ago.
The traditional 30-year fixed-rate mortgage averaged 5.75 percent last week, up from 5.74 percent the week before, while the 15-year fixed inched up to 5.27 percent from 5.23 percent.
The average one-year adjustable-rate mortgage actually decreased from 7.02 percent to an even seven percent, but was clearly less favorable than fixed-rate options.
As a result, the total share of mortgage applications that were ARMs fell to just 3.8 percent from 5.4 percent a week earlier.
(photo: fxp)
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