After months and months of dreary news from the worlds of housing and real estate, here's a bit of a pick-me-up: applications for mortgages rose 32.2% during the week of January 4, which was shortened by the New Year's holiday. This was a welcome change, as demand had been heading lower for the three previous weeks. The Mortgage Bankers Association said in its weekly findings that its overall application index rose to 706 from 533.9 the previous week. Holiday-season volatility could be partially responsible for this jump -- in the week surrounding New Year's Day 2007, the application index was 16.6% higher.
Refinance volume spiked 53.9% during the week, while purchase activity was up 14.7%. Refinance applications accounted for 57.7% of total applications, up from 50.9% the previous week. (With all the speculation surrounding future rate cuts, wouldn't homeowners want to wait and see what happens at the next Federal Open Market Committee meeting in two-plus weeks?)
A blog post I recently read, written by 
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