The rise in mortgage interest rates has had contrasting impacts on refinancing and home purchase mortgage applications. While refinancing applications dropped close to a 10-year low, home purchase applications rose to within sight of a nine-year high. Buyers bringing forward an application in advance of further rate hikes explains the recent strength of housing demand. Meanwhile, the number of rental households in the first quarter of 2018 was down compared to a year earlier; the fourth quarter in a row of year-on-year declines. But the drop over that period has been small, and the number of apartments under construction has also levelled off. That has kept multifamily rental vacancies low, and supported rental growth.
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