Mortgage Applications Fall Again: MBA

According to the Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey released Wednesday by the ""Mortgage Bankers Association"":http://www.mbaa.org/default.htm (MBA), mortgage applications decreased during the week ending February 12, 2010, marking the second consecutive week of declines.

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From week-to-week, the Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, inched down 2.1 percent on a seasonally-adjusted basis. In addition, the Refinance Index fell 1.2 percent from the

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previous week, and the seasonally-adjusted Purchase Index dropped 4 percent during the same period.

The four-week moving average for the seasonally-adjusted Market Index was up 1.1 percent, and the Refinance Index average jumped 1.8 percent. However, the four-week average was down 1.2 percent for the seasonally-adjusted Purchase Index.

The share of mortgage activity showed minor changes in this week's survey. The refinance share decreased to 69.3 percent of total applications from 69.7 percent the previous week, and the adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) share of activity decreased to 4.4 percent from 4.5 percent the week prior.

As mortgage activity waned, interest rates remained relatively unchanged, MBA reported. The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed mortgages remained at 4.94 percent, and 15-year fixed-rate mortgages remained steady at 4.33 percent. Marking the only change on a week-to-week basis, the interest rate for one-year ARMs fell to 6.67 percent from 6.68 percent the previous week.