Refinance activity crashed during the week ending May 22 as mortgage rates saw their largest increase in months, according to the MBA.
The group’s home loan application index slipped 14.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis (13.8 percent unadjusted) during the week, though lending was still up 28.5 percent compared to a year earlier.
Refinance activity was off a whopping 18.9 percent, while purchase apps increased a meager one percent; for some reason the MBA hasn’t been releasing FHA numbers lately.
That pushed the refinance share of mortgage activity to 69.3 percent of total applications from 73.6 percent a week earlier.
Back in late March, refinances accounted for nearly 80 percent of all applications when rates slipped to record lows.
But rates appear to have bottomed out, and are even rising, with the popular 30-year fixed climbing 12 basis points to 4.81 percent.
Meanwhile, the 15-year fixed remained unchanged at 4.44 percent and the one-year ARM jumped to 6.55 percent from 6.38 percent.
Still, the adjustable-rate mortgage share of total activity increased to 2.6 percent from 2.4 percent of applications.
The MBA’s weekly survey, conducted since 1990, covers roughly half of all retail residential loan applications.
However, multiple and declined applications are counted, and can clearly skew the data, especially in today’s climate.
(photo: timlewisnm)
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