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The Attractions and Perils of Flexible Mortgage Lending

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  • Mark J. Garmaise

Abstract

A mortgage program that offered borrowers greater flexibility in the timing of repayments increased a bank's volume by over 35%. Loans in the program exhibited superior performance. Despite this, a regression discontinuity analysis shows that the causal impact of offering flexibility was to attract borrowers to the bank who experienced quadruple the average delinquency rate. These contrasting findings are driven by the fact that the bank engaged in ex post sorting of stronger borrowers into the flexible program. This sorting masked the ex ante adverse selection effects that offering flexibility had on the entire borrowing pool. The Author 2013. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Society for Financial Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com., Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Mark J. Garmaise, 2013. "The Attractions and Perils of Flexible Mortgage Lending," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 26(10), pages 2548-2582.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:rfinst:v:26:y:2013:i:10:p:2548-2582
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/rfs/hht050
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Mauricio Villamizar‐Villegas & Freddy A. Pinzon‐Puerto & Maria Alejandra Ruiz‐Sanchez, 2022. "A comprehensive history of regression discontinuity designs: An empirical survey of the last 60 years," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 1130-1178, September.
    2. Gene Amromin & Jennifer Huang & Clemens Sialm & Edward Zhong, 2018. "Complex Mortgages [Why don’t lenders renegotiate more home mortgages? Redefaults, self-cures, and securitization]," Review of Finance, European Finance Association, vol. 22(6), pages 1975-2007.
    3. Marianna Battaglia & Selim Gulesci & Andreas Madestam, 2024. "Repayment Flexibility and Risk Taking: Experimental Evidence from Credit Contracts," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 91(5), pages 2635-2675.
    4. Kathleen W. Johnson & Robert F. Sarama, 2015. "End of the Line: Behavior of HELOC Borrowers Facing Payment Changes," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2015-73, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    5. Claes Bäckman & Peter van Santen, 2020. "The Amortization Elasticity of Mortgage Demand," Economics Working Papers 2020-16, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    6. Garmaise, Mark J., 2020. "Alternative mortgage contracts and affordability- overview by Mark J. Garmaise," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    7. Griffin, John M. & Kruger, Samuel & Maturana, Gonzalo, 2019. "Do labor markets discipline? Evidence from RMBS bankers," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(3), pages 726-750.
    8. Bäckman, Claes & Lutz, Chandler, 2020. "The impact of interest-only loans on affordability," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    9. Rose, Jonathan, 2021. "Short-term residential mortgage contracts in American economic history," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).

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