The average new home loan size rose to a record high in July as the housing supply crunch drove more prospective buyers to turn to newly-built homes, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA). Even as the number of mortgage applications for new home purchases fell by a seasonally unadjusted 4 percent between June and July, the average loan size hit a record high, MBA said in a release. “Mortgage applications for new home purchases declined in July—as is typical most summers when home sales start to moderate—but did come in at the second-strongest July reading since the inception of MBA’s survey in 2012,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s associate vice president of economic and industry forecasting. Strong buyer demand coupled with constrained supply drove the average loan size of new homes from $392,370 in June to a record high of $402,440 in July. “Homebuilders are still facing elevated building costs and accelerating home-price …