April was the third consecutive month in which there were more cures than new defaults reported by the members of the Mortgage Insurance Cos. of America. But the month was also the worst of the year so far for primary new insurance written.
The cure/default ratio for April was 106.1%, with 43,362 cures reported and 40,875 defaults. For March, the ratio was a record high of 143.9%, while for April 2010, it was 109.1%. MICA data for February 2011 and beyond does not include information from United Guaranty, which is no longer a member of the group.
Primary new insurance written for April was $3.7 billion, of which $4.7 million came through the bulk channel. This is the lowest dollar volume of the year so far (even if UG was included, it is unlikely NIW volume would have topped January's $6.4 billion).
Application volume was 20,733 in April, compared with 21,602 in March and 17,972 in February (2011's low point).
Insurance-in-force slipped by another $5 billion between March and April, to $615.7 billion.
New pool risk written in April was a miniscule $200,000, compared with $3.4 million in March.
