Released: December 23, 2006

Holiday brings refinancing boomlet

Source: Kenneth R. Harney, Washington Post (Free Registration)

You may be thinking about the holidays, but thousands of your fellow homeowners have been thinking about refinancing, rate reductions, cash-outs and money-saving debt consolidations.

For the past two weeks, they have been bombarding lenders with applications for mortgage refinancing - driven by the most attractive rates in more than a year. Refinancings were up in mid-December by 60 percent over the corresponding period last year, and they accounted for more than half of all new mortgage applications - the highest proportion since the spring of 2004.

Thirty-year fixed rates slipped below 6 percent two weeks ago, and although they have rebounded slightly, they are still nearly a percentage point below where they were last summer. Fifteen-year fixed-rate loans in the mid-to-upper 5 percent range are readily available to applicants with solid credit.

Could a holiday-season refi be in the cards for you? Maybe, but it probably depends on whether you fit into one of several categories where today’s rates make a lot of sense:

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