Vacancies and Rent Dispersion in a Stochastic Search Model with Generalized Tenant Demand

I model imperfect information, derive a downward sloping market demand curve, and explain vacancies in a partial equilibrium model of a rental housing market. Tenants can be completely described by an exogenous demand curve, perhaps arising from differences in income, preferred location, or tastes, and view vacant units based on a stochastic arrival of rental information. Free entry of these landlords induces excess rental housing capacity (equilibrium vacancies). I determine the equilibrium distribution of rents for vacant units, show that this rent distribution may be discontinuous, and explore the equilibrium vacancy rate to changes in exogenous parameters. The resulting characterization of equilibrium distributions of rents may be amenable to econometric modeling exploring the relationship between market rents and vacancies.     

中国一线城市房租形成机理和调控对策

房租是由房屋租赁市场的需求和供给两个方面决定的,而房屋租赁市场的需求和供给都受到房屋交易市场所形成的房价的影响。房价对房屋租赁市场需求的影响主要是由于房屋租赁市场和房屋交易市场的替代效应所导致,房价对房屋租赁市场供给的影响主要由房屋租售比和房价的上涨幅度决定。我国一线城市房价近十年的平均年上涨率为10%左右,这导致了我国一线城市的房屋租售比维持在极低的水平。随着房价的平稳,房租必然大幅上涨,故必须采取措施增加一线城市房屋租赁市场的供给,以供给量的大幅增加稳定房租。     

Release of a liquidity regulation: What do we learn for credit and house prices?

This paper studies the effects of the release of a limit on banks’ maturity transformation – akin to the Net Stable Funding Ratio – for mortgage supply and house prices. After the regulatory easing, credit supply increased only for the banks that were previously constrained by the regulation and not for the others. We also show that the expansion in mortgages triggered by the deregulation accelerated house prices. The effect was channeled through higher demand for housing and the relaxation of borrowers’ financial constraints. Even though the impact of the credit supply shock persisted, the interaction between credit and house prices was not conducive to a housing market overheating.     

Household Housing Demand: Empirical Analysis and Theoretical Reconciliation

Since owner-occupied housing is partly a financial asset, expectations of capital gain or loss play a role in housing demand. In recent years, some “hot” housing markets have exhibited an increase in demand when housing prices rise and a decrease when they fall, suggesting the presence of capital gains forces that outweigh the traditional neoclassical demand response associated with the standard consumer good. To explore whether this behavior is systematic, we estimate individual household housing demand equations for two large and geographically diverse metropolitan areas, San Francisco and Atlanta. The data base consists of forty nine Public Use Microdata Area samples. The econometric results indicate that own-housing demand is downward sloping in one market but upward sloping in the other. These disparate results are reconciled by showing that they are consistent with two different and explicit special case predictions of the same theoretical model of housing demand and reflect the differing relative strengths of a standard consumption good demand response and of an asset based capital gains effect.     

住房耐用品、土地市场分割与货币失踪之谜

2008年国际金融危机后,我国M2供给增幅远高于CPI上涨幅度,这一现象被学界称为“货币失踪之谜”。本文构建了一个两部门新凯恩斯货币模型来研究这一问题。当外部需求下降后,央行降低利率以提振经济,房地产部门和非房地产部门同时扩张。由于住房属于耐用消费品,具有一定的金融属性,其需求对利率变化更敏感。利率下降后,住房需求相对普通消费品需求上升更多。因为存在土地市场分割,商住用地供给弹性较小,住房需求上升导致商住用地价格上升较多,地价上涨提升了房地产企业的抵押融资能力,房地产部门进一步扩张。普通消费品需求对利率反应小,需求较弱导致工业用地价格上升幅度较小,非房地产部门抵押融资能力小幅提升。因此,非房地产部门产出和CPI只温和扩张。Ramsey最优货币政策模拟表明,只有实现了房地产部门与非房地产部门均衡发展,才能实现社会福利最大化。     

Evidence on the Relationship between Housing and Consumption in the United States: A State‐Level Analysis

We estimate the dynamic effects of U.S. housing market shocks on state‐level spending and home prices from a dynamic common factor model, and identify housing demand and supply shocks using a sign‐restrictions approach. While state‐level spending and house prices gradually respond positively and persistently to aggregate housing demand shocks, there is significant variation across states in the magnitude of these responses. Cross‐state regressions of the estimated responses on an index of mortgage market development suggest that spending in states with greater opportunities for home equity borrowing is more sensitive to housing demand shocks than in states with fewer opportunities, which is consistent with the prominence of a “collateral” channel over a “wealth” channel in explaining the link between housing and the overall economy.     

House prices and rents: An equilibrium asset pricing approach

We use a relatively general intertemporal asset pricing model where housing services and consumption are non-separable to measure overvaluation of housing in relation to rents in Spain, the UK and the US. Part of the increase in real house prices during the late nineties can be seen as a return to equilibrium following some undershooting after previous price peaks. However, marked increases in house prices led to price-to-rent ratios above equilibrium by mid-2003 (around 30% above equilibrium in the UK, 20% in Spain and 10% in the US). Part of that overvaluation — particularly in Spain and the UK — may be attributable to the sluggishness of supply in the presence of large demand shocks in this market and/or the slow adjustment of observed rents.     

Limits to arbitrage and hedging: Evidence from commodity markets

We build an equilibrium model of commodity markets in which speculators are capital constrained, and commodity producers have hedging demands for commodity futures. Increases in producers' hedging demand or speculators' capital constraints increase hedging costs via price-pressure on futures. These in turn affect producers' equilibrium hedging and supply decision inducing a link between a financial friction in the futures market and the commodity spot prices. Consistent with the model, measures of producers' propensity to hedge forecasts futures returns and spot prices in oil and gas market data from 1979 to 2010. The component of the commodity futures risk premium associated with producer hedging demand rises when speculative activity reduces. We conclude that limits to financial arbitrage generate limits to hedging by producers, and affect equilibrium commodity supply and prices.     

房价波动、金融稳定与最优宏观审慎政策

本文通过构建包含家庭住房抵押借款摩擦和银行贷款摩擦的动态随机一般均衡模型,重点考察了异质性冲击下房价波动对金融稳定的影响。研究发现,房价上涨会导致银行风险溢价及杠杆率显著上升,进而加剧金融体系的内在不稳定。为降低房价波动及维护金融稳定,选取两类宏观审慎政策工具进行逆周期调控实验,结果表明,在住房需求冲击下,金融管理部门应选取贷款价值比政策,且应对房贷积极调控,而对房价进行中性调控。在最终产品部门生产率冲击、房地产部门生产率冲击及跨期偏好冲击下,应选取资本充足率政策,但对房贷和房价调控力度的把握则存在差异。本研究为厘清房价波动对金融稳定的动态传导机制,以及金融管理部门如何选取宏观审慎政策工具以稳定房价并降低系统性金融风险提供了启示。     

The trading behavior of foreign,domestic institutional,and domestic individual investors: Evidence from the Taiwan stock market

In this paper, we apply the threshold cointegration model of Hansen and Seo (2002), incorporating differences in the nonlinear behavior of investors across regimes. An examination of the trading behavior of foreign, domestic institutional, and domestic individual investors in Taiwan revealed no predominance among the three types of investors. When the market was near equilibrium, the purchases of domestic individual investors positively impacted stock prices. This finding, which is consistent with Choe et al. (2005), suggests that domestic individual investors have an edge in investment performance over other types of investors. However, when the market departed substantially from equilibrium, the purchases of foreign and domestic institutional investors predicted a rise in stock prices. On the other hand, domestic individuals traded at worse stock prices; these prices tended to fall (rise) after the purchase (sale).     

Housing vacancies,thin markets,and idiosyncratic tastes

This paper presents a model with rental housing vacancies in equilibrium. Because of the indivisibility and multi-dimensional heterogeneity of housing units, the housing market is thin. As a result, a typical household entering the market is willing to pay a premium for its most-preferred over its second most-preferred available (vacant) unit. This confers monopoly power on landlords, which they exploit by setting rents above costs. Free entry and exit force profits to zero, with vacancies as the equilibrating mechanism. A nice feature of the model is that housing vacancies are socially useful in expanding the choice set of entering households, though there is no presumption that the market vacancy rate is socially optimal. Thin markets are modeled by assuming an idiosyncratic component to households' tastes over housing units.The positive and normative properties of the basic model, which assumes costless search, are investigated. Then the model is extended to treat costly search. Finally, directions in which the model could usefully be extended are discussed.     

House Prices and Government Spending Shocks

We show that dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models with housing and collateralized borrowing predict a fall in house prices following positive government spending shocks. By contrast, we show that house prices in the United States rise persistently after identified positive government spending shocks. We clarify that the incorrect house price response is due to a general property of DSGE models—approximately constant shadow value of housing—and that modifying preferences and production structure cannot help in obtaining the correct house price response. Properly accounting for the empirical evidence on government spending shocks and house prices using a DSGE model therefore remains a significant challenge.     

Seemingly Irrational but Predictable Price Formation in Seoul’s Housing Market

This paper tests the dynamics implied by a supplied-constrained view of the relationship between market fundamentals and house prices in the case of Seoul’s condominium market. The view is that supply constraints have led to serious shortages in certain submarkets, and that these shortages have led to a rapid rise in house prices and to panic buying or inflation-induced investing and to further price increases. The estimation period of the test is November 1988–February 2007. The results suggest that house prices in Seoul are highly persistent because of these supply constraints. Additionally, we do what we can with the available data to determine if house price increases serve to increase demand further, and if rent-price ratios and nominal interest rates are a good predictor of how housing prices in Seoul will evolve over time.     

Ambiguous Information,Portfolio Inertia,and Excess Volatility

I study the effects of risk and ambiguity (Knightian uncertainty) on optimal portfolios and equilibrium asset prices when investors receive information that is difficult to link to fundamentals. I show that the desire of investors to hedge ambiguity leads to portfolio inertia and excess volatility. Specifically, when news is surprising, investors may not react to price changes even if there are no transaction costs or other market frictions. Moreover, I show that small shocks to cash flow news, asset betas, or market risk premia may lead to drastic changes in the stock price and hence to excess volatility.     

Heterogeneous Expectations,Restrictions on Short Sales,and Equilibrium Asset Prices

Under heterogeneous expectations, the mean–variance model of capital market equilibrium is employed to determine the effect restricting short sales has on equilibrium asset prices. Two equivalent markets differing only with respect to short sale restrictions are compared. It is shown that, in general, risky asset prices can either rise or fall due to short sale constraints. However, under a homogeneity of beliefs for the covariance matrix of future prices, short sale constraints will only increase risky asset prices.     

Housing, consumption and monetary policy: How different are the US and the euro area?

This paper provides a systematic empirical analysis of the role of the housing market in the macroeconomy in the US and the euro area. First, it establishes some stylised facts concerning key variables in the housing market on the two sides of the Atlantic, such as real house prices, residential investment and mortgage debt. It then presents evidence from Structural Vector Autoregressions (SVAR) by focusing on the effects of monetary policy, credit supply and housing demand shocks on the housing market and the broader economy. The analysis shows that similarities outweigh differences as far as the housing market is concerned. The empirical evidence suggests a stronger role for housing in the transmission of monetary policy shocks in the US. The evidence is less clear-cut for housing demand shocks. Finally, credit supply shocks seem to matter more in the euro area.     

非均衡市场下房地产寡头产量竞争研究

在非均衡市场下建立房地产寡头产量竞争动态博弈模型,并分别用理论和数值模拟的方法对其演化加以分析。研究表明,在区域市场非均衡条件下,房地产寡头可以通过重复博弈达成产量竞争均衡;在房地产开发生产技术、管理水平的特定阶段和稳定的税赋政策下,市场供需的非均衡状态和地价房价比决定区域房地产寡头产量博弈的均衡解、均衡稳定性和均衡演化路径,从而决定房地产供给市场的类型。政府宜采取地价房价比控制、市场供需结构调节和税收调整同步的方式调控房地产市场,政策效果相得益彰。     

房地产金融调控政策效应评价:佛山实证

近年来,国家通过采取金融、财税、产业等政策措施组合对房地产市场进行调控,对于维护房地产市场平稳运行,促进经济健康发展起到了积极作用。但是,当前我国房地产供求矛盾突出、房价上涨过快等深层次问题并未得到有效解决。本文以佛山为案例的研究表明:宏观经济因素、前期的房价上涨情况、个人住房消费贷款、人民币汇率升值是导致房屋需求增加的最主要因素。为此,要提高房地产金融调控的有效性,应进一步完善房地产金融调控机制,实行需求调节与供给调节相结合的金融调控新方式;加强跨境资金流动管理,合理引导外资流向和流量。     

房地产市场垄断、供给失灵及其治理

本文在考察我国房地产市场供求特征及其经济后果的基础上,构造了一个具有正反馈效应的概念模型。认为由房地产市场的垄断特性带来的供给失灵使得房地产潜在使用需求受到抑制,投资需求得到强化,而这两者又放大和强化了房地产供给失灵,从而解释了我国目前房地产市场房价高、房屋空置率高的矛盾现象,指出房地产问题的根源在于市场垄断下的供给失灵,并提出通过增加房屋供给和制度建设两个方面来治理供给失灵、改善房地产市场运行的政策建议。     

房地产市场运行及未来趋势展望

2011年在以限购为主的房地产调控政策作用下,市场需求受到抑制,商品房销售增速明显低于历史同期平均水平。保障性住房全年开工建设任务已经提前完成,受其拉动,房地产开发投资保持高位。当前,保障性住房建设全面展开,以限购为主的调控政策短期不会退出,并呈现向二三线城市扩大的趋势,一些前期房价上涨过快的城市降价促销愈演愈烈,商品房价格回调趋势明显。