REAL ESTATE

Thrifts and Mortgages: While a drop in mortgage refinancing volume has hurt most mortgage lenders in Orange County, the local thrifts are doing better than other financial institutions, according to a report from TRW REDI Property Data, a real estate data company in Riverside.

In the first five months of this year, local thrifts accounted for 20.4% of new home mortgages originated in the county, as compared to 17.6% of mortgages for the same period last year. The shift is occurring because savings and loans do not rely as heavily on the refinancing business as do banks and independent lenders and more of the thrifts’ home loans use the increasingly popular adjustable rate mortgages, which allows them to place the risk of higher rates on the borrower.