Last week, the Federal Reserve announced that it would buy $500 billion in mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae. Mortgage rates immediately dropped, and that led to a surge in mortgage refinancing activity for the week — even with the Thanksgiving holiday.

"Pretty much everything we looked at was sold before we could get there,” Ron Canterbury said by phone Tuesday.

November 25, 2008

A hard freeze crippled the credit market in September, leaving borrowers scrambling for mortgages.  But with the huge moves that the federal government has made to encourage banks to make loans, mortgage lending has thawed in recent weeks.

The ‘O’ Word.  It’s over.  The worst of the downtown is over.  From here on, most trendlines will turn up.  ‘O’ stands for ‘optimism’.