A surprising turn of events in the mortgage industry was unveiled recently. The number of applications for both new mortgages and refinancing were up last week nearly 18% over the same week last year. This is in part due to mortgage rates sliding slightly and borrowers with ARM’s refinancing to a fixed rate loan.

While most of the news has been centered on the sub-prime lending practices of banks all over the country, many of these homeowners will be refinancing should rates continue to slowly tread lower. This could potentially create a new wave of business for lenders that have been battered by investors scared about record setting foreclosure rates the doom and gloom crowd are expecting just over the horizon. I for one am going to wait and see what happens, but I don’t think it will be as bad as the perennial market bears tend to lead on.

[tags]mortgage, lending, shaun carter, interest rates, foreclosure, homes, real estate, ARM, APR, fixed rate[/tags]