Year-Over-Year Applications For New Home Purchases Up For Fifth Straight Month

Mortgage applications for new home purchases increased 26.1% year-over-year in June, according to the latest Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) Builder Application Survey. Compared to May, applications were down by 5%.

MBA estimated new single-family home sales were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 687,000 units last month, down 9% from May’s recorded sales of 755,000 units.  On an unadjusted basis, MBA estimates that there were 60,000 new home sales in June, down 6.3% from 64,000 new home sales in May.

By product type, conventional loans accounted for 65.5%, compared with 24.1% for FHA loans, 10% for VA loans and 0.3% for RHS/USDA loans. The average loan size of new homes decreased from $403,581 in May to $400,281 in June.

“New home purchase activity continues to be a bright spot, as both new home applications and home sales were up on an annual basis,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s vice president and deputy chief economist. “With existing inventory still held back by homeowners, prospective buyers have turned to newly built homes instead. Rising mortgage rates in June likely caused some pullback in purchases over the month, as the 30-year fixed rate averaged close to 6.8%. However, applications for new home purchases have now shown annual increases for five consecutive months.”