Refi's

Daily Real Estate News  |  March 26, 2008Refinancing Boosts Mortgage Applications
Borrowers hoping to refinance their home mortgages pushed mortgage applications up 50 percent last week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association's weekly survey.

The index rose 48.1 percent to a seasonally adjusted 965.9 last week compared to the previous week. On an unadjusted basis, the index increased 46.1 percent and was up 41.1 percent compared with the same week a year ago.

The refinance index rose 82.2 percent to 4255.2 from 2335.2 the previous week, while the purchase index increased only 10.6 percent. In all, the refinance share of mortgage activity increased to 62 percent of the total.

"The Federal Reserve acted last week to bring some stability to the mortgage-backed securities market and we saw an immediate impact with a drop in mortgage rates.

"With a drop in the 30-year fixed rate of at least a quarter of a point, we saw a sharp increase in refinance applications, but applications for home purchases also increased over where they have been the last few weeks, although still below where they were this time last year," said Jay Brinkmann, MBA's Vice President of Research and Economics.

Mortgage rates were down:

• 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.74 percent from 5.98 percent;
• 15-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.23 percent from 5.24 percent;
• 1-year ARMs increased to 7.02 percent from 6.99 percent.