MICA Reports Mix of Good, Bad News

While almost all the private mortgage insurance companies posted significant financial losses for the third quarter, the industry data provided by the Mortgage Insurance Companies of America for September provide a mixed bag of good and bad news.September was the third-best month of the year for primary new insurance written, with a total of $28.9 billion, up 6% from $27.3 billion in August. There was a slight slip in the amount of traditional mortgage insurance written, which decreased by $700 million to $23.1 billion. Bulk insurance written increased by $2.3 billion to $5.8 billion. On the negative side was a slip of almost 19% in the number of applications received, from a revised number of 206,457 for August to 168,073, the worst month in this category since February. For July and August, MICA made revisions to its cure/default data. The revisions resulted in boosting the cure-default ratio from 53.4% (as originally reported) for July to 60.9%. The August revision moved the cure/default ratio from 57.9% to 66.6%. The change means June was the only month with a cure/default ratio under 60%. For September, there were 33,706 cures and 54,699 defaults, for a ratio of 61.9%. MICA can be found online at http://www.micanews.com.