Rush To Refinance -- Or Hold Off?

With mortgage rates at their lowest levels in decades, many homeowners are racing to lenders, seeking to refinance.

But is that the right move?

On The Early Show Friday, Whitney Tilson, founder and managing partner of Tilson Mutual Funds, said now's a great time, but it may pay to be patient and wait a little longer.

Tilson pointed out that mortgage rates have "crashed. Just in the past seven weeks, they've been declining every week. ... For a 30-year fixed rate orange, they've declined to five-point-two percent, which is a 50-year low. That's great news. It's about the only good news in the housing market right now."



So, is now the time to re-fi?

"It's sort of like trying to time the stock market, I suppose," Tilson observed.

He pointed out that a proposal "floating around in Congress" could, if backed by the incoming Obama administration and OK'd by lawmakers, send rates even lower, to the neighborhood of four-and-a-half percent.

"That's the dilemma: Do you grab the 50-year low rate right now or wait a few weeks and you might get a chance to refinance at an even lower rate?"

The answer, he explained, could lie in your circumstances.

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