Mortgage applications for new home purchases slipped 11% in April from the month before, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Builder Application Survey.
The decline can be attributed to a surge in applications for new homes in February and March, said Lynn Fisher, MBA vice president of research and economics, in a news release Friday. She also noted that in March of last year a peak in applications occurred.
The data on mortgage applications is also not seasonally adjusted.
The MBA further reported that 67.8% of total applications were conventional loans. FHA loans made up 18.3%, while USDA loans represented 0.6% and VA loans 13.3% of all applications. The average loan size in April dropped to $325,233 in April from $328,898 a month earlier.
The MBA estimated that new single-family home sales were running at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 503,000 units in April, down 12.4% from the pace set in March.
By Jacob Passy May 13, 2016
