Refinancing a first mortgage puts legal principles in conflict when other, junior, liens also exist. On one hand, the … principle that seniority follows time priority leaves the new refinancing mortgage junior to mortgages that were junior to the … original, refinanced first mortgage. On the other hand, the principle of equitable subrogation gives the refinancing mortgage …

a mortgage on borrower balance sheet outcomes. We find that on average, refinancing into a lower-rate mortgage reduced …We use quasi-random access to the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) to identify the causal effect of refinancing … borrowers' default rates on mortgages and nonmortgage debts by about 40 percent and 25 percent, respectively. Refinancing also …

We model mortgage refinancing as a bargaining game involving the borrowing household, the incumbent lender, and an … set containing the population of mortgages in Belgium. In particular, households' refinancing propensities are positively … correlated with the number of local branches and negatively correlated with local mortgage market concentration. Moreover …