More Americans may be looking for homes in the near future, which could be a boon for the title insurance industry in the coming weeks.

Total mortgage applications improved 1.6 percent during the week ending Aug. 1, 2014, the latest Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey from the Mortgage Bankers Association showed. When the figure was not adjusted, it still rose 1 percent week-over-week.

There was a decline in the Purchase Index during the week, as it slipped 1 percent from a week earlier, the report explained. There also was a drop of 2 percent when the figure was unadjusted.

Refinances also improved during the week, as the Refinance Index rose 4 percent during the period, according to the report. There was a slight rise in the refinance share of mortgage activity, as it improved to 55 percent during the week from the previous level of 53 percent. Meanwhile, the adjustable-rate mortgage share of activity stayed at 8 percent.

Industry members uneasy about market conditions
There still may be some issues in the housing market, especially when it comes to the current state of sales, and many industry members may be looking at the situation cautiously.

A total of 40 percent of agents surveyed noted that July was a good time to purchase a home, lower than the same point last year, when it was 46 percent, according to a report from Redfin. More than three-quarters of those polled felt that making a sale in July was a good idea, slightly lower than the same month in 2013.

"In May, 40 percent of sellers surveyed by Redfin said that they planned to list their homes above market value even though home sales had dropped by 9 percent since the year before," said Nela Richardson, chief economist at Redfin. "Typically it takes sellers six to nine months to adjust to a price change, but this latest shift is longer. Prices have moved down and then up so much over the past five years that it's even more difficult for sellers to have a realistic baseline for what their homes are worth in the current market."

Nearly one-quarter of agents polled felt that sellers were in the power position in their market, the report noted. However, this was sizably lower than during the spring, when 35 percent felt this way.