Apps Don't Augur Well for MIs in '06

It may be a long year for the mortgage insurance industry if the number of applications received in January is any indicator.According to the Mortgage Insurance Companies of America, there were 95,131 applications received in January, down from 160,038 in December and 103,901 in January 2005. In calendar year 2005, last January was the worst month for application volume. In terms of dollar volume for traditional primary mortgage insurance written, the group's members did $10.0 billion worth of business, compared with $12.8 billion in December and $10.9 billion last January. A comparison of total volume between December and January is skewed because of an unusually high number of bulk transactions that were insured. In December, $26.7 billion of primary new insurance was written; one month later, it was down 48% to $13.6 billion. Just short of $14 billion was written in January 2005. The cure/default ratio for January was 75.6%, with 37,270 cures and 49,311 defaults. MICA can be found online at http://www.micanews.com.