November Origination Stats a Time Capsule For Refi Demand

The refinance share of originations in November remained at 53 percent for the third month even though the average interest rate on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased 14 basis points over that period. ICE Mortgage Technology’s Origination Insight Report put the refinance share for conventional loans at 57 percent, down 1 percentage point month-over-month and the VA share up 2 points to 40 percent. FHA refinances accounted for 24 percent of that volume, the same as in October.

"While it's nice to see resilience in November, November is ancient history now that rates have spiked at their fastest pace in years over the past 2 weeks," said MBS Live CEO Matt Graham.  "We can only assume the refi share will erode in the coming reports."

The average note rate for all loans was 3.29 percent November and 3.32 percent for both Conventional and FHA loans. All three rates were up 10 basis points from the October average.  The VA loan at 2.95 percent, increased 7 basis point from the prior month.

The FHA share of loans slipped 1 point to 11 percent. VA and Conventional loans maintained the same 5 percent and 79 percent shares they had in October.

The average time to close all mortgages and all purchase mortgages each dipped 1 day to 46 and 49 days. The decline was driven by a 1-day decline in processing purchase loans by both Conventional and FHA lenders.

The closing rate for all loans dropped from 79.2 percent in October to 78.5 percent. The rate for refinances was down to 77.7 percent from 78.3 percent and purchase loans declined to 80.6 percent to 79.8 percent. ICE computes closing rates based on applications submitted 90 days earlier, in this case, in July.

ICE’s Origination Insight Report mines its application data from a large sample of approximately 80 percent of all mortgage applications initiated on its proprietary platform. The company says the report is a strong proxy of the underwriting standards employed by lenders across the country.