Explaining UK house price inflation 1971–89

An econometric analysis of UK house price inflation and changes in residential construction is presented for the period 1971–89, paying particular attention to the supply side of the housing market. The results of this analysis are used to examine the contributions of the various factors to the nominal rate of house price inflation. While the results confirm the importance of real disposable income in determining house prices, they indicate that supply variables may be of greater importance than interest rates in this respect. There are close similarities between the three housing booms of the 1970s and 1980s.     

Ripple effect in house prices and trading volume in the UK housing market: New viewpoint and evidence

This study adopts the data of house prices and trading volume in the overall UK housing market and in the housing markets in the 10 major regions in the UK to estimate the ripple effect in the trading activities in the housing markets. First, this study details why the ripple effect occurs in the housing market price and volume using static and cobweb dynamic models. The results of the panel-based unit root tests indicate that the relative price and volume ratios show constancy, signifying that long-run equilibrium relationships exist between the regional and national housing markets in the UK. The frequency of the transaction volume convergence behavior is higher than that of the overall house prices.     

Forecasting UK house prices: A time varying coefficient approach

Previous studies of UK house prices, developed from the demand and supply ofhousing or from the asset market approach have been poor in terms of robustness and ex-post forecasting ability. The UK housing market has suffered a number of structural changes, particularly since the early 1980s with substantial house price increases, financial market deregulation and the removal of mortgage market constraints through competition. Consequently, models which assume that the underlying data-generating process is stable and apply constant parameter techniques tend to suffer in terms of parameter instability. This article uses the Time Varying Coefficient (TVC) methodology where the underlying data-generating process in the UK housing market is treated as unstable. The estimation results of the TVC regression of UK house prices is compared with those obtained from three alternative constant parameter regressions. Comparisons of forecasting performance suggest the TVC regression out-performs forecasts from an Error Correction Mechanism (ECM), Vector Autoregressive (VAR) and an Autoregressive Time Series regression.     

House price dynamics,conditional higher-order moments,and density forecasts

Most studies on housing price dynamics are only concerned with the conditional mean and variance, but overlook other higher-order conditional moments and the structural change characteristics inherent in housing prices. In order to take into account these two important issues, this study utilizes the generalized Markov switching GARCH model to explore house price dynamics and conditional distribution for US market over 1975Q1–2007Q4. The housing return follows two distinct dynamics: the bust regime and the boom regime. The volatility pattern is different in the bust and boom regimes. In addition, the conditional densities derived by the regime-switching model change dramatically over time and are significantly different from normal distribution. More importantly, the regime-switching model can detect in advance a weak US housing market such as the one that occurred in the middle of 2007. The in-sample fitting ability of regime-switching model, which incorporates higher-order moments, has significant improvements compared to the single-regime AR and AR-GARCH models. For the out-of-sample Value-at-Risk forecasting performance, the ability of regime-switching AR-GARCH model to forecast one-step-ahead density is better compared to the single-regime AR-GARCH model.     

中国体制转型与城镇居民家庭财富分配差距——一个资产转换的视角

本文以中国城镇住房改革为例,从资产转换的角度研究了中国体制转型过程中城镇居民家庭财富积累及分配差距的产生。20世纪80年代以来的房屋政策鼓励工作单位将住房出售给现有居民,即住房商品化。通过1988、1995和2002年中国城镇住户收入调查的数据分析,20世纪90年代中期以来的住房商品化过程中,相对于私营部门居民家庭,干部和国有单位工作的家庭更容易以折扣价从工作单位获得住房。随着近期住房市场的繁荣,原有的以及住房商品化过程中产生的住房不平等,已经转化成国有和私营部门家庭财富的更大差距,而且干部的住房增值优势和国有部门家庭的财富优势随着市场化的推进有加速增加的趋势。     

The Role of the Media in Sustaining Ireland's Housing Bubble

This paper examines Irish mainstream media coverage of the housing bubble that burst in 2007 and plunged Ireland into economic and financial crisis. It is shown that news organisations largely sustained the bubble until the property market collapsed. As such, news stories reflected the views and interests of the Irish corporate and governmental sectors, which had adopted neoliberal policies during the ‘Celtic Tiger’ years (1990s to 2007). A political economic conceptualisation of the Irish media outlines four factors explaining why this is so: (1) news organisations have multiple links with the political and corporate establishment, of which they are part, thus sharing similar interests and viewpoints; (2) just like elite circles, they hold a neoliberal ideology, dominant during the boom years; (3) they feel pressures from advertisers, in particular, real estate companies; and (4) they rely heavily on ‘experts’ from elite institutions in reporting events. The last section presents a detailed empirical analysis of Irish media coverage (newspapers and television) of the housing bubble that confirms the above claims. It is shown that prior to the bubble's collapse, the media made little mention of it, remained vague about it or tried to refute claims that it even existed, thus sustaining it.     

China’s house price: Affected by economic fundamentals or real estate policy?

Many theory and empirical literature conclude that house price can reflect economic fundamentals in the long-term. However, by using China’s panel data of 35 main cities stretching from 1998 to 2007, we find that there is no stable relationship between house price and economic fundamentals. House price has deviated upward from the economic fundamentals since government started macro-control of the real estate market. We consider that the mechanism between the house price and economic fundamentals is distorted by China’s real estate policy, especially its land policy. Meanwhile the policy itself is an important factor in explaining the changes of China’s house price. Then we estimate the dynamic panel data model on house price and the variables which are controlled by real estate policy. The result shows: land supply has negative effects on house price; financial mortgages for real estate have positive effects on house price; and the area of housing sold and the area of vacant housing, which reflects the supply and demand of the housing market, has negative effects on house price. We also find some differences in house price influence factor between eastern and mid-western cities. Finally, we propose policy suggestions according to the empirical results.     

Bernanke versus Taylor: a post mortem

Our analysis sheds light on the issue of whether the monetary policy contributed to the recent housing boom and bust. We have estimated and analysed a model that allows a comparison between the actual policy and several alternative Taylor rules. When the Taylor rule path was computed using revised data and the deflator for the GDP, we found a notable impact on key housing market variables, supporting Taylor’s critique of the Fed policy. However, the bulk of our evidence suggests that the policy as it would have been conducted under our real-time Taylor rules would not have had any significant impact on the housing market variables. This conclusion is robust with regard to the price index used as well as the relative weights used on the inflation and output gaps.     

Testing for rational bubbles in the US housing market

The presence of a bubble in the US housing market prior to the 2007 subprime mortgage financial crisis is investigated. This is done by looking into the relationship between house prices and rental prices, known as the price–rent ratio, which is an important measure of a potential deviation between house prices and its fundamental value. Additionally, the interest rate is taken into account since it is an important factor in determining demand for housing mortgages and thereby influencing house prices, and explosive behavior of house prices is considered. These relationships are investigated through a theoretical and econometrical framework. The empirical evidence suggests that there was a bubble in the housing market prior to the financial crisis, even when controlling for the decreasing interest rate and the fundamental information given by the rental price in the period. Explosiveness was the main source of the price increase, such that a bubble was present in the housing market after correcting for other fundamental factors. The econometric procedures used in the analysis may therefore be relevant for monitoring the housing market.     

House price,mortgage premium,and business fluctuations

This paper investigates the transmission mechanism of mortgage premium to characterize the relationship between the housing market and business cycle for the U.S. We find that mortgage premium is crucial for the amplification and propagation of the model to match the main properties of U.S. housing market and business cycles. The counterfactual analysis suggests that had the Federal Reserve raised the interest rate in 2003Q1, it would have curbed the housing market boom before the crisis, yet failed to alleviate the precipitous decline in housing market activity after the crisis. Moreover, the pre-emptive monetary policy aimed to contain the housing market boom can effectively lower volatilities of major economic aggregates; however, it also exerts a significantly negative effect on the levels of these economic aggregates. Thus, using monetary policy to stabilize asset price inflation involves a trade-off between the volatility and the level of economic activity.     

HOUSING AND HOUSING FINANCE IN AN ERA OF INFLATION AND DISINFLATION: INTRODUCTION

So far, the 1980s have been the decade of disinflation in the housing market. The United States has experienced four remarkable years during which house prices have declined in real terms, and, at least in some markets, in nominal terms as well. At the same time, mortgage interest rates have risen to unprecedented levels, and the housing finance system has experienced extraordinary stresses, which are contributing to a remarkably rapid process of fundamental structural change. This comes immediately after a 15-year period of variable, but persistent and accelerating inflation, culminating in a speculative housing boom from 1977 to 1979.     

The Relationship Between Saving and Credit from a Schumpeterian Perspective

After 1995, the United States experienced housing and mortgage booms, fuelled by increased lending from less regulated institutions, such as hedge funds. At the micro level, the housing boom may have left families with more wealth, but the mortgage boom may have increased their financial vulnerability. Using the Federal Reserve’s Survey of Consumer Finances, we consider both wealth creation and a select number of financial vulnerability measures of homeowners. The data indicate that the housing boom was not only associated with larger house values, but also moderated wealth gains and substantially greater financial vulnerability of homeowners. Both trends were more pronounced among middleincome and Hispanic families, who saw larger wealth gains, but also greater increases in financial vulnerability than their counterparts. Given the breadth of the spread in homeowners’ financial vulnerability alongside sharply higher house prices, our results support the link between more deregulated financial markets and rising financial instability.     

Residential Mobility, Housing Equity and the Labour Market

UK commentators have noted that the UK housing market may hinder labour market flexibility. The present paper uses UK household longitudinal data (BHPS) for the early 1990s, and estimates single and competing risk discrete time duration models of residence duration to investigate the impact of negative housing equity on residential moves. Strong evidence for an adverse impact on mobility is found, along with results to suggest that the home-owners do not move in response to changing labour market conditions. Negative equity in the early 1990s therefore exacerbated housing market related rigidities in the job matching process     

A simple model of a speculative housing market

We develop a simple model of a speculative housing market in which the demand for houses is influenced by expectations about future housing prices. Guided by empirical evidence, agents rely on extrapolative and regressive forecasting rules to form their expectations. The relative importance of these competing views evolves over time, subject to market circumstances. As it turns out, the dynamics of our model is driven by a two-dimensional nonlinear map which may display irregular boom and bust housing price cycles, as repeatedly observed in many actual markets. Complex interactions between real and speculative forces play a key role in such dynamic developments.     

An alternative method for identifying booms and busts in the Euro area housing market

This article develops a model-based method to detect booms and busts in the Euro area housing market. A model is constructed and tested, whereby the user cost rate, a demographic variable, unemployment rate, disposable income, debt-to-income ratio and housing stock are fundamental variables significantly explaining house price (HP) developments. Booms/busts are identified as episodes when the HP index exceeds the levels implied by those economic fundamentals. Furthermore, a cross-check with boom/bust episodes based on other methods is carried out to substantiate the results, while the ability of the model in predicting booms/busts in real time is also tested.     

Credit constraints,inelastic supply,and the housing boom

In this paper, I develop a dynamic general equilibrium model to study the sensitivity of house price changes with respect to credit constraints. I find that house prices are sensitive to changes of the down payment requirements if owner-occupied houses and rental houses are inelastically supplied. I then use the model to evaluate the housing boom during the 1995–2005 time period. I find that, under the assumption that owner-occupied housing and rental housing cannot be converted to each other, the increase in real household income and the decline in down payment requirements can explain a large fraction of the observed house price and price–rent ratio changes during the 1995–2005 time period. However, the model fails to match the interest rate changes during the 1995–2005 period.     

Capital Inflows and House Prices: Aggregate and Regional Evidence from China

Rising house prices in China have been of concern for investors and policymakers. Prices have risen substantially in the last decade, especially in large urban cities, and some economists have expressed concerns about the affordability of residential housing for young adults. This phenomenon becomes a major concern for policymakers, in terms of managing policies to balance the residential needs of individuals and the transition to a market economy. Theoretically, house prices ought to be linked to economic factors such as disposable income, availability of land to build and credit policy. However, it appears that traditional economic theories fail to appropriately explain house prices in China. We provide an explanation from the perspective of capital inflows into China. In terms of per capita remittances, China receives the highest inflow of foreign capital, and this may have a significant impact on risk adjusted returns in the Chinese market. To investigate this relationship, we use the vector error correction model to assess the impact of capital inflows on house prices. We find that capital inflows have a significant positive effect on house prices. The study makes important contributions to understanding the relationship between house prices and foreign remittances after controlling for other economic factors. China is a large economy. Because the impact of economic development in China has not been consistent across the country, we address the regional differences in the house price changes to capital inflows. Using regional data, we show that capital inflows have an asymmetric effect on the housing market across different provinces and cities of China. This has important implications for the development of economic policies in China that aim to provide fair access to residential housing for everyone. These findings are also relevant to investors in the housing market, whether investing for a personal residential home or as part of their diversified investment portfolio. It will also be informative to see how a reversal of capital inflows associated with tighter financing conditions in advanced countries will affect house prices in China.     

实体经济低迷与房地产繁荣之“困”*

本文以实体经济低迷和房地产行业繁荣的困局为切入点,研究了困局产生的原因,并从房产税的视角探讨了如何走出这一困局。本文发现：第一,经济进入新常态后,宽松的货币政策导致增加的货币流向了房地产行业,资源的错配使投资和产出长期无法走出“L”型区间;第二,本文通过三次模拟实验证明,政府可以考虑适当地通过对代表性家庭征房产税进行宏观调控,解决资源错配问题。     

Daily market news sentiment and stock prices

In recent years there has been a tremendous growth in readily available news related to traded assets in international financial markets. This financial news is now available through real-time online sources such as Internet news and social media sources. The increase in the availability of financial news and investor’s ease of access to it has a potentially significant impact on market stock price movement as these news items are swiftly transformed into investors sentiment which in turn drives prices. In this study, we use the Thomson Reuters News Analytics (TRNA) data set to construct a series of daily sentiment scores for Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) stock index constituents. We use these daily DJIA market sentiment scores to study the influence of financial news sentiment scores on the stock returns of these constituents using a multi-factor model. We augment the Fama–French three-factor model with the day’s sentiment score along with lagged scores to evaluate the additional effects of financial news sentiment on stock prices in the context of this model using Ordinary Least Square (OLS) and Quantile Regression (QR) to analyse the effect around the tail of the return distribution. We also conduct the analysis using the seven-day simple moving average (SMA) of the scores to account for news released on non-trading days. Our results suggest that even when market factors are taken into account, sentiment scores have a significant effect on Dow Jones constituent returns and that lagged daily sentiment scores are often significant, suggesting that information compounded in these scores is not immediately reflected in security prices and related return series. The results also indicate that the SMA measure does not have a significant effect on the returns. The analysis using Quantile Regression provides evidence that the news has more impact on left tail compared to the right tail of the returns.     

有限理性、异质预期与房价内生演化机制

本文通过将传统蛛网模型推广为双边异质预期蛛网模型,分析了房价的内生演化机制,通过数值分析考察了市场参与者心理预期对房价的影响。结论表明,市场中基本面分析者的预期不影响房价动态系统的稳定性,技术分析者与开发商的预期则导致房价波动,进而影响房价动态系统的稳定性。模型还给出了房地产开发成本对房价动态演化的影响。开发成本不仅对基本面价格有正向冲击,而且当成本增加到一定临界值后也将导致房价演化出现分岔。