Explaining House Prices in Australia: 1970–2003*

This paper aims to explain changes in real house prices in Australia from 1970 to 2003. We develop and estimate a long-run equilibrium model that shows the real long-run economic determinants of house prices and a short-run asymmetric error correction model to represent house price changes in the short run. We find that, in the long run, real house prices are determined significantly and positively by real disposable income and the consumer price index. They are also determined significantly and negatively by the unemployment rate, real mortgage rates, equity prices and the housing stock. Employing our short-run asymmetric error correction model, we find that there are significant lags in adjustment to equilibrium. When real house prices are rising at more than 2 per cent per annum, the housing market adjusts to equilibrium in approximately four quarters. When real house prices are static or falling, the adjustment process takes six quarters.     

房价、房价偏离与溢出效应：来自珠江三角洲的经验证据

利用国外较新的PMG估计法,探讨影响珠江三角洲商品房均衡价值的因素及房价偏离,并采用脉冲响应函数分析房价偏离在不同城市间的溢出效应。随着收入和人口的增加,房价加速上涨;经济越发达的城市,房价收入比越大,房价的增长速度更快、波动更为剧烈。人均可支配收入是推动房价上涨最重要的长期因素,通货膨胀次之,贷款最小;但贷款、通货膨胀是主要的短期推动力。虽然珠江三角洲地区房价总体上没有明显的泡沫,但波动很剧烈,一旦发生调整,其幅度将很大。除江门外,其他城市只对深圳房价偏离的冲击做出响应,而深圳对其他城市房价偏离的冲击没有响应;江门房价更多的受到来自中山和珠海的影响,深圳是珠江三角洲房价波动的源头。     

ECONOMIC GROWTH AND INCREASING HOUSE PRICES

Abstract.  Several cities and countries in Asia and North America have experienced large increases in housing prices. We extend the 1991 paper by S. Rebelo to simulate this situation. We show that growth in real housing prices can result as economic growth persists, even when population growth is zero. Another finding is that reported increases in housing prices might be underestimated. In particular, the growth rate of a relative price index may converge to zero even when house prices in real terms display sustained growth.     

Population Ageing and House Prices in Australia

This article assesses the effect of population ageing on housing consumption and house prices. Using two approaches, this article finds that the ageing of the population may cause average real house prices to be between 3 and 27 per cent lower than they otherwise would be over the period 2008–2050. The first approach is an econometric estimation of house prices for Australia over the period 1980–2008. The second approach is a simulation of a life cycle‐optimising model with representative overlapping generations.     

Local House Price Effects of Internal Migration in Queensland: Australia's Interstate Migration Capital

We examine the causal impact of internal migration on housing prices across 82 Statistical Areas Level 3 regions in Queensland, Australia from 2014–2019. The primary findings are: (i) an annual increase in the inflow of migrants equal to 1 per cent of a region's initial population leads to a 0.6 to 0.7 per cent annual increase in Queensland's house prices across different empirical specifications; (ii) this effect differs between the Greater Brisbane metropolitan area and Rest of State areas; (iii) migration from New South Wales fails to produce a significant influence on house price growth in Queensland.     

Housing,consumption and monetary policy: how different are the first-, second- and third-tier cities in China?

This article presents an empirical analysis of the relationship between house prices and the real economy in China’s first-, second- and third-tier cities. A Structural Vector Autoregression model is applied to study the impacts of monetary policy shocks and housing demand shocks on various housing markets across China. We also investigate the role of house prices in the transmission mechanism of monetary policy. The results reveal that in first-tier cities, raising interest rates has a stronger negative effect on house prices. Also, as house prices decrease in first-tier cities, private consumption declines sharply. There is a stronger role of housing markets in the transmission of monetary policy shocks in these cities. Our findings indicate that interest rate adjustment could effectively curb spikes in housing prices in the first-tier cities, but the impact of such adjustments on household consumption must also be considered.     

Convergence and spillover of house prices in Chinese cities

The issue of house price convergence in 34 Chinese cities is investigated. We augmented the convergence model with contemporaneous spatial dependence in house prices and found that price convergence and positive spatial spillover are both present. We explicitly addressed the endogeneity problem by introducing a Bayesian instrumental variable setup, which was estimated with particle filtering techniques. From a growth poles perspective, the empirical evidence indicates that the spread effect in regional house prices outweighs the backwash effect. The identified positive spatial spillover has two effects on the growth of house prices in Chinese cities. First, the spillover elevates the trajectories of the steady-state growth paths of house prices. Second, the spillover narrows the gaps between the growth paths of house prices in neighbouring cities. Shocks to the socio-economic variables of a city generate their own effects on domestic house prices that dominate the effects arising from cross-city price feedbacks, thus mitigating the prospect of level convergence. Our findings also suggest a collaborating role between time and spatial dependence parameters. The identification of inter-city spillover, which is a conditioning factor for regional house price convergence, offers implications to policies that are most likely to be effective in reducing regional disparity.     

The Real Story of Housing Prices in Australia from 1970 to 2003

Despite the popular and public policy interest in housing prices, there have been few reliable published data for housing prices in Australia. In this article we aim to provide an authoritative account of prices for houses and apartments (units) in Australia from 1970 to 2003. Where possible we draw on data from land title offices or on studies that draw on these data, but we also draw on supplementary data in some cases. The first part of the article describes the major data sources of Australian house prices. The main body of the article provides our best estimates of median house and unit prices and real price indices in the capital cities and in the rest of Australia along with explanations for their derivations. We also estimate how improvements in housing quality have influenced real house prices.     

限购背景下存准率与房价的关系研究

2010年以来,我国主要的大中城市纷纷出台了商品房的限购政策,同期法定存款准备金率也多次调整.在限购政策背景下,本文运用广义矩(GMM)方法,将限购政策作为逻辑变量加入到估计模型中,对限购背景下的存款准备金率调整与商品房价格的关系进行了定量分析.结果表明,限购政策对于抑制房价过快上涨具有显著意义,同时,政府上调存款准备金率在滞后2期和3期时对于抑制商品房价格过快上涨也具有一定的积极作用,但商品房价格不会因存款准备金率的上调而出现急速下跌,而是在存款准备金率持续上调的过程中呈现出先上涨后下跌,再上涨、再下跌的交替变化特征.研究同时发现,限购政策和存款准备金率调整对于我国东部地区城市影响显著,而对于中西部城市影响则不显著.基于此,本文提出了运用存款准备金率手段在抑制商品房价格过快上涨过程中的对策建议.     

土地财政制度对房地产价格的影响因素研究*

本文基于动态系统GMM模型,运用Stata软件和计量经济学方法,对2009—2015年中国15个大中城市房价水平的变化趋势进行研究。结果表明：（1）地方政府依靠土地财政和房地产维持地方财政,土地财政是导致房价上涨的根本原因。（2）在经济下行的背景下,地方政府和房企共同经营土地,地方政府试图通过做大土地财政拉动地方经济。（3）中央政府选择有利于中央政府效用水平增加的经济发展方式。所以中央政府、地方政府与房企会形成经济增长联盟共同推动房价上涨。（4）房企行为对土地财政导致的高房价具有放大效应,且作用效果在东部、中西部地区呈现明显的区域差异。本文的贡献是发现了房企行为与土地财政、房价上涨之间相互作用的逻辑关系,为找到缓解房地产价格上涨的措施提供了新的可能性。     

The Macroeconomic Outlook

A slow recovery is expected from the current recession. Since reaching a trough in the September quarter of 1990, real gross domestic product (GDP) has followed a flat path which is likely to continue through to the September quarter of 1991. A slow recovery may then commence in the December quarter of 1991. This is consistent with real GDP growth of -0.9 per cent in 1990-91 followed by 2.4 per cent in 1991-92 and around 3 per cent per annum to the mid- 1990s compared with 'normal' growth of 2.5 per cent per annum.
This recovery is likely to see the unemployment rate at over 10 per cent for most of 1991-92, before moving to around 8 per cent by the mid-1990s.
Inflation may fall sharply from a peak of 8.0 per cent in 1989-90 to a trough of 3 to 4 per cent in 199 1–92, due to the recession and movements in oil prices. With a slow recovery, inflation may increase to 4 to 5 per cent per annum in the medium term.
The current account deficit has fallen from 5.9 per cent of GDP in 1989-90 to a likely level of 4.1 per cent in 1990-91, but part of this gain is cyclical rather than structural. Thus the deficit is expected to increase to around 5 per cent during recovery and remain flat to the mid- 1990s, implying steady increases in the ratio of foreign debt to GDP.
Looser monetary policy would erode part of the forecast sustained reduction in inflation. Looser fiscal policy would lead to a higher current account deficit.     

A national or local phenomenon? A comparison of the US and the Chinese housing markets

This article investigates the common movements of house prices across cities as well as the macroeconomic underpinnings of the comovements in the US and China. Our empirical results indicate more differences than similarities between the US and the Chinese housing markets. The results from a Bayesian dynamic latent factor model indicate that the fluctuations of house prices across cities in the US are more a national phenomenon, while the dynamics of house prices across cities in China are mainly driven by the city-specific component. We further use VAR models to compare the roles of the underlying determinants in these two housing markets. The results show that the roles of monetary policy shocks and aggregate fluctuations in driving the common movements of house prices across cities differ substantially between the US and China at both short and long horizons.     

Population and house prices in the United Kingdom

Real house prices rise in the United Kingdom amid growing concern of an impending correction. The rate of household formation has increased with strong population growth, due to elevated rates of natural increase and net migration, and lack of growth in average household size, due to a rise in single‐person households with population ageing. This paper presents an overlapping generations model of housing, endogenous labour, savings and growth to analyse the effect of an increase in the household formation rate and speculative demand under rational expectations on house prices in a general equilibrium. We find that real house prices rise over time if the rate of household formation outstrips the rate of housing supply, but do not follow a speculative bubble path in the long run. The results explain why the upward trend in real house prices reflects market fundamentals and has continued despite population ageing as the number of working and retired households grows relative to the number of older people seeking to sell.     

我国房地产税与房价关系的实证研究

本文以我国1988--2006年房地产税和房价的相关数据为基础,通过协整分析、向量自回归、误差修正和Granger因果检验,研究了我国房地产税对房价的短期影响及两者的长期关系。结论如下：我国房地产税和房价之间存在长期稳定的均衡关系,房价和房地产税存在正相关关系,调高房地产税会引起房价增长;在不考虑地方公共支出对房价影响的情况下,房地产税的长期影响效应要大于短期影响效应;我国房地产税制设置欠完善,房地产税的变化会影响房价,而房价的变化不会影响房地产税。最后,本文提出,应对现行的房地产税收制度进行改革,减少房地产流通环节的税种和税负,开征物业税。     

Has Canadian house price growth been excessive?

The dramatic rise in the ratio of Canada's average house price to average rent has led to speculation that there is a bubble in the Canadian housing market. Others have argued, however, that the currently high level of house prices may be rationalized by the low cost of financing, given the decline in interest rates over the last two decades. In this article, we assess these arguments through the lens of a simple asset pricing model applied to city‐level data. We quantify the extent to which excess growth in Canadian house prices depends on the nature of the current regime governing real interest rates, expectations of rent growth in different cities and variations in property taxes.     

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.     

利率效果区域异质性、收入跨区 影响与房价溢出效应*

本文首先构建了理论分析框架,解释了中国不同城市间房价溢出效应、收入对房价的跨区影响,以及利率调整对不同城市房价的区域异质性影响。本文利用GVAR模型对该框架进行了实证,结果显示北京等一线城市的房价波动对其他城市具有较大的溢出性,而中西部城市的房价溢出性则不明显。一线城市和东部城市的房价波动不仅受本城市人均收入变动的影响,还在很大程度上受其他城市收入变动的影响,而中西部城市的房价则主要受本城市收入变动的影响。利率变动对一线城市和东部城市的房价影响则较大,而对中西部城市的房价影响有限。本文结论具有明确的政策含义,比如政府应通过稳定一线城市房价以达到稳定全国房价的目的,促进公共产品均等化,实行地区差异化的房地产政策等。通过利率调整来调控房价也是一个可行的政策选项。     

Global capital markets,housing prices,and partisan fiscal policies

In recent years, global imbalances have channeled the excess savings of surplus countries toward the real estate markets of deficit countries. By consequence, the deficit countries that attracted lots of foreign capital experienced large run‐ups in house prices, whereas most surplus countries that exported capital exhibited flat or slow house price growth. We first use new house price data and a novel instrumental variable design to show the causal relationship between housing prices and capital inflows, particularly through debt bonanzas. We then argue that international capital flows affect the fiscal policy preferences of both voters and political parties by way of their impact on housing prices. Where capital inflows are large and housing prices are rising, we expect voters to respond by demanding both lower taxes and less publicly‐provided social insurance because rising house prices allow homeowners to self‐insure against income loss. In contrast, declining house prices produce greater demands for social insurance, particularly among those most exposed to housing market risk. We present evidence from two cross‐national surveys that supports these claims, as well as a “before and after” analysis of the housing crash in Eastern Europe. We also show that the connection between house prices and social policy also manifests itself in government spending outcomes, mediated by partisan control.     

住宅价格与居民收入均衡关系及住房支付能力稳定性

文章通过聚类分析将35个大中城市按2000-2009年住宅价格分为四组,结合面板单位根、协整和格兰杰因果检验对住宅价格和居民收入的均衡关系进行了分析,并运用FMOLS模型探讨了住房支付能力稳定性问题。分析表明:35个大中城市的住宅价格和居民收入之间存在长期均衡关系,但支付能力稳定性比较弱;住宅价格和居民收入互为因果关系;住房支付能力稳定性弱不是普遍现象,仅存在于高房价城市;除收入外,城市的食品消费、医疗、教育和交通通信等软硬件设施也是影响住宅价格的重要因素。     

Real Rates of Return in Electricity Supply: New South Wales,Tasmania and Victoria*

This paper uses a newly developed economic return model to estimate the real (inflation adjusted) costs of supply, and rates of return, for the electricity systems in three States over very long time periods. It is shown that because of a combination of public ownership and the use of historical cost accounts, the real return on capital tends to fall with the onset of rapid inflation such as occurred in the mid 1970s In NSW in particular the rapid growth in demand for electricity in the 1970s due to falling real electricity prices and considerable increases in other energy prices has given rise to a major investment program and rapidly developing excess capacity. Higher real electricity prices in the 1980s, combined with the economic slump of 1982, resulted in low or negative growth rates in demand Much of the boom I bust mentality evident in all three States may have been avoided or ameliorated had the electrical supply authorities been required to earn even a very modest real rate of return of (say) 4 or more per cent p.a. which is considerably below the (pre-tax) return earned in the corporate sector.