The loan structure and housing tenure decisions in an equilibrium model of mortgage choice

The objective of this paper is to understand how loan structure affects (i) the borrower's selection of a mortgage contract and (ii) the aggregate economy. We develop a quantitative equilibrium theory of mortgage choice where households can choose from a menu of long-term (nominal) mortgage loans. The model accounts for observed patterns in housing consumption, ownership, and portfolio allocations. We find that the loan structure is a quantitatively significant factor in a household's housing finance decision. The model suggests that the mortgage structure preferred by a household is dependent on age and income and that loan products with low initial payments offer an alternative to mortgages with no downpayment. These effects are more important when inflation is low. The presence of inflation reduces the real value of the mortgage payment and the outstanding loan over time reducing mobility. Changes in the structure of mortgages have implications for risk sharing.     

论住房抵押贷款终止偿付型理性违约

住房抵押贷款债务人不仅会进行提前偿付型理性违约 ,在相关机制不健全时也会进行终止偿付型理性违约。终止偿付型理性违约是指在住房抵押贷款存续期内 ,债务人在自身财务状况正常的情况下 ,因经济理性而从某一时刻起终止继续履行对尚欠贷款本息的偿还责任的违约行为。它发生的客观性在于住房抵押贷款债务人对所购住房损失最小化或收益最大化的财务预期能否顺利实现。建立终止偿付型理性违约发生的条件模型 ,可找出抵押率、贷期、已还款量和已履约时间等变量与条件模型的内在关系 ,进而设计出我国金融机构主动防范终止偿付型理性违约风险的思路。     

Household’s optimal mortgage and unsecured loan default decision

How do households make optimal borrowing and default decisions when they have the option to borrow in multiple ways? In this paper, I analyze households’ optimal mortgage and unsecured loan borrowing and default decisions in the context of the recent recession. I model households as able to default on mortgage debt to walk away from capital losses, at the price of foreclosure. However, a household can also default on unsecured debt to maintain its home, in exchange for a longer exclusion from credit markets following default. Depending on the costs of each alternative, financially constrained households exhibit heterogeneity in optimal default decisions.Next, I analyze how mortgage loan modification policies, after a sudden drop in house prices, affect household choices in the mortgage and unsecured loan markets. The quantitative exercise shows that the government-driven mortgage modification program, initiated in 2009, reduces the mortgage default rate by 0.27% points. However, this increases the unsecured loan charge-off rate by 0.66% points.     

Asymmetric behavior of Australia's Big-4 banks in the mortgage market

This paper presents an alternative framework for modeling the behavior of banks in setting lending and/or saving rates. In a short-run dynamic model, we correct for deviations from the long-run path using three feedback coefficients capturing different disequilibria. This enables us to test for both amount and adjustment asymmetries by considering the size and direction of any deviations. We use this model to examine the relationship between the official cash rate (set by the Reserve Bank of Australia as a monetary policy tool) and the standard variable mortgage rates of Australian Big-4 banks using weekly data from 2001 to 2012. The evidence indicates both types of asymmetries along with synchronized rate-setting behavior. Overall, the banks immediately pass on 120% of any rate rise, but only 85% of any rate cut. Further, when mortgage rates are substantially above the equilibrium path, we find no significant attempt to lower rates, but faster adjustment when rates are below equilibrium values. This finding has important implications for the RBA's monetary policy transmission mechanism and the effectiveness of the expansionary versus contractionary policy.     

ACCOUNTING FOR CHANGES IN THE HOMEOWNERSHIP RATE*

This article accounts for the boom in homeownership from 1994 to 2005 by examining the roles of demographic changes and mortgage innovations. To measure the impact of these factors, we construct a quantitative general equilibrium overlapping generation model with housing. In the long‐run, mortgage innovation accounts for between 56 and 70% of the increase whereas demographics account for a much smaller portion. We test this result by considering changes in mortgages after 1940. We find that the introduction of the conventional fixed rate mortgage accounts for at least 50% of the observed increase in homeownership during that period.     

个人住房贷款行为与房贷调控的有效性分析

本文利用成都市房地产交易的微观数据(2004—2006),实证检验了我国房地产信贷政策的变化对微观个体住房贷款决策行为的影响效果。我们发现,地方购房者的贷款决策对中央利率调控有明显反应。实证结果显示:当长期贷款利率升幅较短期贷款利率升幅高0.1百分点时,贷款者选择短期贷款的概率增加8.4个百分点;而且利用商业住房贷款利率和公积金贷款利率变动差异的"自然实验",我们有效控制了可能由宏观政策内生性产生的计量问题,从微观角度为长、短期利率政策的有效性提供了更可靠的实证检验。此外,我们还发现首付比例政策并没有得到地方银行的严格实施。因此,文章建议政府进一步重视利率政策对房地产市场的调整,而包括首付比例等相关政策的实施需加强对地方执行部门监管的力度。     

基于风险转移模型的次贷危机传导研究

利用金融体系风险转移模型及其对风险分担和金融稳定性的影响的理论分析了美国次贷危机中的风险分担和风险传导。分析表明,银行体系的激进性贷款行为和恶意转移风险的道德风险促成了次贷危机的生成与传导;而金融市场的衍生产品创新在转移和分散风险的同时,也放大了美国次贷危机的风险。     

Time to default in the UK mortgage market

This paper employs duration analysis to investigate the timing of default in the UK mortgage market. Our analysis is performed on an ex ante basis, in that our explanatory variables are available to mortgage lenders when the loan is first made. We estimate both standard Weibull distributions and generalizations of the Weibull that permit non-monotonic hazard functions. The models fit the data well, suggesting that we have captured the major sources of variation in duration. We find that ‘cash flow’ variables, such as salary and interest rate paid, play the largest role. Surprisingly, loan-to-value ratios are either insignificant or influence default times in a counter-intuitive direction.     

Financing difficulties for SMEs and credit rationing – an expanded model of mortgage loans with asymmetric information

This article presents a new model of mortgage loans under reasonable assumptions. A several key variables that affects the success of a project, such as project risk, total investment, lending rate,mortgage, and self-financing are jointly considered in the model. The model takes the participation constraints and the incentive compatibility constraints into account for enterprises and banks on project investment actions respectively. Our model can explain the coexistence scenario of small medium enterprises’ (SMEs) financing difficulties and credit rationing in credit markets with asymmetric information. It reveals that higher enterprise self-financing for the project is a “credible factor” to the bank. Banks put forward strict requirements on mortgage for the SMEs with low proportion of project self-financing, which will lead to two scenarios:one is that some SMEs would not get loans due to insufficient mortgage assets; other is that some SMEs will voluntarily give up loans because of loan requirements, even if they have enough mortgage assets. Rationing is implemented both to large enterprises and SMEs, but the degree of rationing is gradually strengthened with the reduction of self-financing scale for the project.     

低地价引资增加了工业产值吗*——基于土地抵押贷款视角

本文通过构建一个DSGE模型发现,低价出让工业用地并不一定会显著增加工业产值。特别是对于严重依赖土地抵押贷款的地区,低地价使得抵押物价值下降,从而抬高了企业贷款成本,导致工业增长乏力。进一步地,本文对101个城市2000—2015年的面板数据进行了分析,发现低地价确实能够促进东部地区的工业增长,却对中西部地区的工业产值无明显的增进作用。考虑到东部、中西部对土地抵押贷款依赖度的差异,本文认为只有当某地区不依赖土地抵押贷款时,低地价才能显著地促进工业增长。     

Market structure and credit procyclicality: Lessons from loan markets in the European Union banking sectors

The aim of this paper is to investigate whether the market structure has an impact on procyclicality in the European Union bank loan markets. The cyclical responses of three types of bank loans (residential mortgage loans, consumer loans, and corporate loans) are quantified separately using the interacted panel vector autoregression model at the country level and the single-equation panel regression model at the bank level. Using a sample of 26 European Union countries, we find that the procyclical responses of residential mortgage loans and consumer loans are significantly stronger and prolonged when the banking sector is more concentrated or dominated by foreign banks. However, we find that there are nonlinear relationships between the market structure and credit procyclicality based on bank-level data. We also find some heterogeneities between advanced and transitioning European Union banking sectors. Finally, our findings confirm the leading role of residential mortgages in intensifying credit fluctuations.     

Forecasting Canadian mortgage rates

Mortgage rates are one of the important drivers of the housing market. While there is a literature looking at the pass-through effect from Central Bank rates to mortgage rates, there is less known about how useful Central Bank rates are for forecasting mortgage rates. This article uses a selection of models (ARIMA, ARIMAX, BATS, state space error, trend seasonal (ETS), Holt Winter, random walk, simple exponential smoothing (SES), OLS and VAR) to forecast Canadian 5-year conventional mortgage rates. Based on RMSE, regression-based approaches like ARIMAX or OLS that use Central Bank rates to forecast mortgage rates are preferred when it comes to forecasting Canadian mortgage rates 6 or 12 months into the future, respectively.     

Mortgage product diversity: responding to consumer demand or protecting lender profit? An asymmetric panel analysis

This article explores determinants of mortgage product diversity for owner-occupied and investment loans in the Australian housing mortgage market. From 2001 to 2012, 65 lenders introduced 1220 mortgage products in Australia. We examine whether the product proliferation was a result of consumer demand or a response to pressure to lower lending rates. We find that consumer demand for mortgages does not have a significant relationship with the number of mortgage products, but that decreases in the policy interest rate are highly significant as an explanatory variable for product proliferation. Such behaviour is consistent with information obfuscation, reducing the ease with which consumers can compare lending rates. Further, the relationship between mortgage products offered and the policy interest rate is asymmetric: decreases in the cash rate are associated with increased mortgage products offered, but increases in the cash rate have a more muted effect on decreasing the number of products.     

Subprime Mortgage Tremors: An International Issue

The subprime mortgage crisis has negatively affected individuals, investors, lenders, and economies worldwide. This paper first examines contributing factors of the crisis: predatory lending, predatory borrowing and mortgage fraud, unethical practices, unregulated mortgage brokers, off-balance-sheet activity, and the infusion of capital from Asia that provided the fuel for subprime mortgage activity to continue. International markets have both suffered from and contributed to the crisis. Legislation that has been enacted or recommended in the U.S. and the European Union is reviewed. We then make recommendations which could begin to restore confidence of consumers and investors worldwide; however, it is clear that laws and regulations must be enacted quickly to correct the situation and bring stability to investment markets.      

After the great recession : financial sophistication and housing leverage

US households face various choices in saving for retirement, with one of the most common decisions related to maintaining or paying off a mortgage. Using the 2010 and 2013 Survey of Consumer Finances, this study investigates the relationship between financial sophistication and mortgage decisions among middle-age households. A Heckman two-stage selection model is employed to investigate two separate decisions: mortgage holding and loan-to-value (LTV) ratios among mortgage holders. Results indicate that financial sophistication is positively associated with carrying a mortgage and higher LTV ratios. These results imply that financially sophisticated households may be using leverage to increase asset returns.     

The asymmetric price adjustment between REIT and stock markets in Asia-Pacific markets

This paper applies the threshold error correction model to examine the relationship for real estate investment trusts (REITs) and stock, and their asymmetric adjustment behaviors in six Asian/Pacific financial markets: Australia, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, and Hong Kong. Our results show that there has been long-term equilibrium in REIT and stock indices in most of these markets. To earn exceptional profits, it is recommended that investors can sell (buy) the REITs when the indices of REITs are lower (higher) than equilibrium in Australia, Singapore and Taiwan; on the other hand, they should sell (buy) when the REIT market goes up (down) in Hong Kong and Japan. A causality test revealed that previous information about stocks predicted changes in the REITs in all the Asian/Pacific markets. One can also find that the lead–lag relationships are significant. The threshold EC model predicts two-way causality under both the regimes for the financial markets in most countries during all the sample periods. In addition, the adjustment speeds for the stock indices are faster than that for the REIT indices as disequilibrium occurs. This paper also finds that the previous mentioned trading strategies generally remained the same during the period of sub-prime mortgage crisis. However, the threshold EC model predicts one-way causality for both the regimes for the financial markets in most countries during this crisis period. In addition, we also find that the severe shock in REIT markets led investors in Australia and Taiwan to be more conservative during this period. The REIT indices had more effect on stock indices after the sub-prime mortgage crisis. According to the empirical results, we can infer that the degree of market imbalance and the occurrence of the sub-prime mortgage crisis induce the changes in the investment behavior of market participants.     

美国次级房贷危机对中国房贷和金融市场的影响

美国次级房贷危机已对全球股市和美国经济产生较大影响。分析美国次级房贷危机产生的背景和原因,并指出中国的抵押贷款市场存在的重大风险。我们应该以美国次级债危机为借鉴,为中国房地产市场发展和金融市场的健康发展获得一些启示,并做好风险防范措施。     

抵押贷款证券化中的柠檬市场问题及缓释机制

证券化结构设计中的核心问题是解决信息问题。本文通过模型分析美国抵押贷款证券化中柠檬市场问题产生的原因及后果,从4个方面阐述了其缓释机制:自动承销系统的普及、有效的政府主导型SPV、发达的信用评级机构及银行监管资本套利动机,并逐一分析了它们对解决抵押贷款证券化中信息不对称问题的贡献。     

高技术中小企业间接融资方略

我国高技术中小企业在间接融资市场上面临资产信用严重不足、财产可抵押物少、抵押难等阻碍。美英距离型模式比较日德关系型在建立良性循环的间接融资体系方面具有明显优势。我国高技术产业间接融资的发展模式应当以较为完善的间接融资风险分担体系为目标指向，以美英距离型间接融资模式为基本模式指向，并建立以信用担保机构和中介组织向银行担保为主、个人资产担保为辅助的担保体系。