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MBA: Loan applications for new homes sluggish this summer

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After reporting a decrease in new-home loan applications last month, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) said in its release of the monthly Builder Application Survey that mortgage applications for newly constructed homes increased by 1 percent.

The association previously reported on its monthly survey that applications for new homes decreased by 9 percent from May to April, and it attributed the drop to buyers’ habit to apply for new homes in time for the new school year.

This month, the news is slightly more positive, with the MBA reporting that new-home sales increased 8 percent from May on a seasonally adjusted annual basis.

But on an unadjusted basis, there were 45,000 new-home sales in June 2015, unchanged from May, MBA said. The association attributed the sluggish sales to housing price recovery.

“As house prices continue to recover, mortgage applications for the purchase of newly constructed homes increased slightly in June,” said Lynn Fisher, MBA’s vice president of research and economics, but she noted, “Application activity in June was slightly higher compared to the past two years.”

Conventional loans comprised 67.2 percent of loan applications, FHA loans 19.6 percent, RHS/USDA loans 1 percent and VA loans 12.2 percent.

The average loan size of new homes increased from $320,744 in May to $321,678 in June, according to the survey.

MBA’s Builder Application Survey tracks application volume from mortgage subsidiaries of homebuilders across the country. Utilizing this data, as well as data from other sources, MBA is able to provide an early estimate of new-home sales volumes at the national, state and metro levels.

Email Amy Swinderman.


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