"A lot of people come in thinking that a 15- or 30-year fixed-rate mortgage is for them. Then after they have the opportunity to see adjustable rates and their benefits, a lot are changing to the adjustables," said Brent Diehl of SunBank.

But Bob Kinney, executive vice president at Barnett Bank, said, "The demand still seems to be for fixed-rate mortgages. While ARMs are low, there really isn't enough of a spread" - a difference in rates - "to entice people into the adjustable versus the fixed rates." Fixed-rate 15- and 30-year mortgages are running between 7 and 8 percent.

ARMs carry caps - a maximum number of percentage points the mortgage rate can increase each year, and a maximum increase over the life of the mortgage. (They can decrease, too.) Take a look at the mortgage rate chart on Page 2-H and you'll see that most of the one-year adjustables have a cap of 2/6. That means the rate can go up or down no more than 2 percentage points each year, to a maximum of 6 percentage points over the life of the mortgage. Lenders also charge points, each of which represents 1 percent of the loan amount.