Not Over Until It's Over.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)

Since rates on fixed-rate mortgage loans dipped below the 7% mark in August, refinancing volume has picked up steam again, and analysts see no end in sight.

In fact, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter's Kenneth Posner says another 10 to 15 basis point decline in the long end of the yield curve "would significantly increase the size of the refi boom." That kind of a dip could raise the 2001 origination total from its current pace of about $1.6 trillion to nearly $2 trillion, according to Mr. Posner's report.

Mr. Posner is not alone in raising his estimate of refinancing and total-loan origination activity this year. Recently, another stock analyst, Jonathan Gray of Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., raised his lending-volume estimate for 2001 to $1.7 trillion, estimating that refinancing would account for $836 billion of the total.

And researchers at Wholesale Access, Columbia, Md., say the total should be "at least" $1.8 trillion. They say that a $2 trillion year is possible.

To put that magnitude in perspective, consider that there have only been four years when lending volume exceeded the $1 trillion mark, once in 1993 and then each year since 1998. The current record of $1.5 trillion was set in '98, another year when refinancing activity roiled servicing portfolios.

And the August rate drop seems likely to push up the refinancing share of mortgage originations this year. While earlier in the year housing ...