NEW YORK, Jan 28 - Americans applied for fewer mortgages last week as a modest uptick in mortgage rates snapped three consecutive weeks of rising loan applications, an industry trade group said on Wednesday. The Mortgage Bankers Association said its market index, a measure of weekly mortgage activity, fell for the week ending Jan 23 by 5.2 percent to 868.9 as average 30-year mortgage rates rose 0.03 percentage point to 5.58 percent. That compares with the previous week's 916.1, the highest level since the week ended Aug. 1. "These numbers have been robust as of late. This market doesn't want to lie down," said Richard DeKaser, chief economist at National City Corp. The recent application levels, although healthy, have not matched the prior levels reached last year when rates were at these same low levels.
The U.S. housing market has been a pillar of the economy, posting three straight years of record sales, in spite of economic sluggishness. It has defied repeated forecasts for a slowdown and has continued to exhibit unusual strength in the early days of 2004. In a separate housing report this week, sales of existing U.S. homes rose at a record annualized pace to 6.47 million units in December, up 6.9 percent from November, according to the National Association of Realtors. In all of 2003, U.S. homeowners sold a record 6.1 million homes last year, beating 2002's total of 5.566 million homes by 9.6 percent. "We have seen the market get a lift from a decline in rates at the end of last year, but it is still true that the overall trend is one of softening," DeKaser said. Meanwhile, economists reckon sales of new homes probably rose to an annual pace of 1.1 million units in December, up from November's 1.082 million annualized units, according to a poll. The government is slated to release December new home sales data at 10 a.m. EST (1500 GMT). In the mortgage data released on Wednesday, the purchase index, which gauges new requests for home purchases, fell 10 percent to 451.6. That compares with last week's 501.6, the highest level reported since the Mortgage Bankers Association began its weekly survey in 1990.
The Washington trade group's refinancing index slipped 0.9 percent to 3,296.7 from previous week's 3,327.3, which was the highest level since the week ended Aug. 1.//