Homebuyers ponied up the highest downpayments on
record to purchase homes in the third quarter of 2017. ATTOM Data Solutions'
(formerly RealtyTrac) Residential Property Loan Origination Report says that the
median down payment for a single-family home or condo purchased with financing
during the quarter rose to $20,000 from $18,162 in the second quarter of this
year. In the third quarter of last year
the median was $14,400. The most recent
number is the highest in ATTOMs records which date back to 2000.
The $20,000 downpayment represents 7.6 percent of the
median sales price during the quarter of $263,000. The percentage amount was
also a recent high, up from 7.1 percent the previous quarter and 6.1 percent in
the third quarter of 2016. It was the
highest downpayment percentage since the third quarter of 2013.
ATTOM Senior Vice president Daren
Blomquist says, "Buying a home has become a full-contact sport in many markets
across the country, and buyers with the beefiest down payments - not to mention
all-cash buyers - are often able to muscle out those with scrawnier savings. Despite the increasingly competitive nature of
homebuying, the number of residential property purchase loans nationwide
increased to a 10-year high in the third quarter."
The median downpayment exceeded $50,000
in 12 of the 99 statistical areas included in the report. The four highest amounts
were all paid in California markets, with San Jose on top at $247,00 followed
by San Francisco at $170,000, Los Angeles ($118,000) and Oxnard ($105,000). The fifth city on the list was Boulder, Colorado,
with a median downpayment just under $100K.
The report
confirmed an expected downturn in refinancing originations in the third quarter,
but purchase loans and home equity lines of credit (HELOC) originations rose. There
were just under 2.4 million 1-4 family mortgage loans written during the
period, an increase of 17 percent from the prior quarter but 5 percent fewer
from the same quarter last year. Of the total, about 1.1 million were purchase
loans, an increase of 8 percent and 7 percent from the two earlier periods, and
the highest number since the third quarter of 2007.
Purchase mortgage originations rose
by the largest percentage in Raleigh, North Carolina, a 55 percent increase. New York City, Roanoke, Honolulu, and Little
Rock all posted gains of 34 to 39 percent.
Fifty-eight metro areas saw purchase originations fall, with Atlanta
declining 15 percent, Houston down 10 percent and both Boston and Detroit
falling 7 percent.
Also, refinance loans fell 19 percent from
the third quarter of 2016, to 981,773 but that was an improvement of 28 percent
from Q2.
Just under 400,000 HELOCS were originated,
a gain of 19 percent quarter-over-quarter and 12 percent on an annual basis. The
quarter's originations represented a nine-year high.
Among other financing trends noted
in the report was a slight uptick in the number of purchase originations that
involved multiple, non-married co-borrowers. Those loans were up from 22.8
percent in the second quarter and 21.1 percent a year earlier to 23.4 percent.
The
share of loans backed by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) declined from
13.6 percent of all loans originated in the second quarter and 13.2 percent in
Q3 2016 to 12.9 percent. VA loans accounted
for 6.6 percent of originations compared to 6.5 percent and 7.5 percent in the
two earlier periods.
ATTOM derived its loan origination
report from publicly recorded mortgages and deeds of trust collected in more
than 1,700 counties accounting for more than 87 percent of the U.S. population.
Data was gathered for single family
homes, condos, town homes and multi-family properties of two to four units for
this report.