Mortgage applications increased two percent compared to a week earlier driven mainly by an increase in government refinancing, according to data collected from a Mortgage Bankers Association’s (MBA) survey collected for the week ending Dec. 3. The surge was primarily due to the refinance index increasing nine percent from the prior week on a seasonally adjusted basis. At the same time, the purchase index fell five percent from the previous week. “Mortgage rates declined for the first time in a month, prompting a pickup in refinancing, with government refinances increasing more than 20 percent over the week,” Joel Kan, MBA’s associate vice president of economic and industry forecasting, said in a statement. While the refinance share of mortgage activity of total applications went up by 63.9 percent from 59.4 during the previous week, the adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) went down by 3.0 percent. The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) share of total …