Freddie: Cash-Out Refi % Holds Steady

A little less than a third of the homeowners who refinanced their homes in the third quarter got a mortgage at least 5% larger than the original loan, unchanged from the 32% figure recorded in the previous quarter, according to Freddie Mac.The figure was down from 44% in the third quarter of 2002, the government-sponsored enterprise said in its quarterly refinance review. "Over the past three months, mortgage rates began to rise slightly," said Amy Crews Cutts, Freddie Mac's deputy chief economist. "Not surprisingly, we then started to see overall refinancing begin to fall off somewhat from previously high record levels earlier in the year." Freddie Mac can be found online at http://www.freddiemac.com.