MICA: Low Rates Spark Jump in Primary New Insurance Written

The private mortgage insurance industry was another beneficiary of low interest rates between January and February when members of the Mortgage Insurance Cos. of America saw an increase of nearly $1.4 billion in the total primary new insurance written. There was $8.47 billion of traditional and $14.6 million of bulk primary new insurance written in February, compared with $7.11 billion, all in the traditional channel, written in January. In February 2008, there was $19.2 billion in total primary new insurance written; this data, however, includes activity from Triad Guaranty Insurance Corp., now in run-off, and does not include Radian Guaranty, which had yet to rejoin the organization. The number of applications received fell from 71,130 in January to 73,109 in February. The amount of primary new insurance in force decreased for the second consecutive month, from $949.3 billion in January to $944.9 billion in February. The amount of new pool risk written in February was $11.8 million. The cure/default ratio was at its highest point since last March, at 75.5%, with 67,767 cures and 89,722 defaults. It is the first time since Radian's data has been added back into the report that the number of defaults for a month was under 100,000.