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Together, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reported 389,284 refinances throughout the third quarter, according to their conservator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA). The figure compares to a total of 344,507 in the second quarter. As refinance volumes rose, the share of refinances completed through the government's Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) fell further.

Freddie Mac released last week its latest Multi-Indicator Market Index (MiMi), revealing a 0.5 percent uptick in September to a reading of 74.4 after months of slight declines. The most recent improvement puts the index a few points short of the lower threshold for a market considered to be in "stable" territory.

NAR reported Wednesday that contract signings nationally decreased 1.1 percent last month, though they were still up 2.2 percent compared to last October. Despite the monthly drop, Lawrence Yun, NAR's chief economist, said that contract signings have remained at a healthy pace now for six straight months.

According to RealtyTrac, the median price of single-family homes and condos rose 2 percent to $193,000 nationwide in October. This is their highest level since the beginning of the recession in September 2008. That's also a rise of 16 percent from a year ago, though it's still 19 percent below the median peak of $237,537 that occurred in August 2006.

The Commerce Department reported Wednesday that sales of new single-family houses were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 458,000 in October, up 0.7 percent from September's revised rate of 455,000 and 1.8 percent over last year's pace of 450,000 sales.

Redfin reported a 2.2 percent increase in the number of homes sold in October compared to the same month last year, making it the first month to see a significant yearly increase in home sales so far in 2014. Redfin's data reinforces recent findings from the National Association of Realtors, which estimated October home sales at an adjusted annual rate of 5.26 million, an increase of 2.5 percent from last year.

The S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices grew 4.8 percent annually at the national level in September, according to the latest update from S&P Dow Jones Indices. September's growth rate compares to a gain of 5.1 percent in August.

The American Enterprise Institute's (AEI) National Mortgage Risk Index for home purchase loans stood at 11.4 percent in October, little changed from the previous three-month average but nearly 1 percentage point above its year-ago level, the group said Monday.

The latest Nowcast report, powered by Google data and released Monday by Auction.com, projects existing-home sales for November will fall between seasonally adjusted annual rates of 5.05 million and 5.46 million units, with a targeted number of 5.25 million sales.

Dodge Data & Analytics reported a 4 percent drop in the value of new construction starts last month, estimating groundbreaking at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $589.8 billion. The decline followed a 10 percent increase in September, which was the strongest month for total construction starts so far this year.