Mortgage rates near historic lows have sparked a refinancing boom that has U.S. lenders falling down on handling the surge, those good folks at Bloomberg report. “There’s just so much volume,” said Kristin Wilson, a senior loan officer in Bloomington, Minnesota, for Fairway Independent Mortgage Corp., who has seen clients seeking lower rates climb to about half of her business from 20 percent a month ago. “We can’t just ramp up by hiring inexperienced people because they don’t know what they’re doing.”
The lending logjam extends to the nation’s biggest banks, which fired thousands of mortgage workers after interest rates rose in November through February, chilling refinancing demand. Refinancing applications are up 83 percent from this year’s low in February, according to an index compiled by the Mortgage Bankers Association, a Washington-based trade group. After topping 5 percent that month, the average rate on 30-year fixed loans fell two weeks ago to 4.15 percent, the lowest in surveys dating back to 1971 by Freddie Mac, the second-largest U.S. mortgage-finance company.
Find out more at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-02/banks-in-u-s-overwhelmed-by-mortgage-refinancing-boom-after-reducing-jobs.html
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