JupiterResearch on Friday said it has lowered its forecast for the percentage of homebuyers who would get their mortgages online, blaming an unexpected drop in the quality of applicants and other factors.

Last year, the market research firm predicted 5.7 percent, or $77 billion, of the home mortgage market in 2008 would come from people applying and qualifying online. Those numbers, however, were lowered this year to 4.3 percent, or $61 billion.

The actual dollar figure is affected by macroeconomic conditions, since the total market would depend on such factors as higher or lower interest rates, JupiterResearch analyst David Schatsky said. The percentages, however, show fewer people than expected actually obtained their mortgages online.

"We overstated the inclination of consumers to apply online for mortgages," Schatsky said. "Judging from consumer survey data, a larger percentage of consumers said they were going to apply then actually did."

In addition, Schatsky said, "we detected a decline in the quality of the applications."

The ease of applying online probably encourages people who don't have the money or who aren't serious about a mortgage to apply, Schatsky said. As a result, they either fail to qualify or they submit "half-baked" applications that get rejected.

Spam advertising low mortgage rates also has an impact, the analyst said. People who applied for mortgages thinking those rates would be available by legitimate lending institutions were likely to abandon the process once they found out differently.

"That's a very plausible scenario," he said.

For 2004, JupiterResearch, a division of Jupitermedia Corp., lowered the percentage of online mortgages to 1.9 percent, or $28 billion, of the total market. The firm had projected 2.4 percent, or $27 billion.

For 2009, 5 percent, or $74 billion, of all home mortgages are expected to be obtained online, according to JupiterResearch.