Mortgage Bankers Association for the week of 12/16/2009

Market Composite Index: (loan application volume) increased 0.3 percent on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier.

Refinance Index: increased 11.1 percent from the previous week and the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 4.0 percent from one week earlier.

Purchase Index: decreased 0.1 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 3.6 percent compared with the previous week and was 15.4 percent lower than the same week one year ago

Refinance Share of Mortgage Activity: increased to 74.4 percent of total applications from 72.1 percent the previous week.

ARM Refinance Activity: decreased to 4.1 percent from 4.7 percent of total applications from the previous week, which is the lowest share since mid-June 2009.

MBA outlook: (Excerpted from mbaa.org)

In summary the MBAA sees another year of high employment, rising home sales and prices beginning to stabilize. But continued weakness in the job market and excess supply and shadow inventory will slow any recovery in the housing market.

But, property values will not recover until unsold inventory returns to normal levels. Affordability is at record levels, yet there is no strong indication that the demand recovering. People do not yet seem to trust the recovery and many do not have the necessary down payment or can clear tighter loan qualifications The MBAA site economic report indicates a fragile recovery, but makes note that without credit the recovery remains tepid at best. The site makes note: Smaller businesses and consumers are heavily dependent on banks for obtaining credit, and there is little evidence that, as yet, banks have loosened the purse strings. Bank loans to businesses and consumers are still falling with few signs of abatement. To be sure, part of the decline stems from declining demand, but the magnitude of the fall is too large to be explained by weakness in demand alone