IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp5173.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

House Price Volatility and the Housing Ladder

Author

Listed:
  • Banks, James

    (Institute for Fiscal Studies, London)

  • Blundell, Richard

    (University College London)

  • Oldfield, Zoë

    (Institute for Fiscal Studies, London)

  • Smith, James P.

    (RAND)

Abstract

This paper investigates the effects of housing price risk on housing choices over the life-cycle. Housing price risk can be substantial but, unlike other risky assets which people can avoid, the fact that most people will eventually own their home creates an insurance demand for housing assets early in life. Our contribution is to focus on the importance of home ownership and housing wealth as a hedge against future house price risk for individuals moving up the ladder – people living in places with higher housing price risk should own their first home at a younger age, should live in larger homes, and should be less likely to refinance. These predictions are tested and shown to hold using panel data from the United States and Great Britain.

Suggested Citation

  • Banks, James & Blundell, Richard & Oldfield, Zoë & Smith, James P., 2010. "House Price Volatility and the Housing Ladder," IZA Discussion Papers 5173, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5173
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp5173.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James M. Poterba, 1991. "House Price Dynamics: The Role of Tax Policy," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 22(2), pages 143-204.
    2. Campbell, John Y. & Cocco, Joao F., 2007. "How do house prices affect consumption? Evidence from micro data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 591-621, April.
    3. Joao F. Cocco, 2005. "Portfolio Choice in the Presence of Housing," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 18(2), pages 535-567.
    4. Martin Browning & Annamaria Lusardi, 1996. "Household Saving: Micro Theories and Micro Facts," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 34(4), pages 1797-1855, December.
    5. Brueckner, Jan K, 1997. "Consumption and Investment Motives and the Portfolio Choices of Homeowners," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 159-180, October.
    6. Merlo, Antonio & Ortalo-Magne, Francois, 2004. "Bargaining over residential real estate: evidence from England," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 192-216, September.
    7. Engelhardt, Gary V, 1996. "Consumption, Down Payments, and Liquidity Constraints," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 28(2), pages 255-271, May.
    8. François Ortalo-Magné & Sven Rady, 2006. "Housing Market Dynamics: On the Contribution of Income Shocks and Credit Constraints ," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(2), pages 459-485.
    9. Engelhardt, Gary V., 1996. "House prices and home owner saving behavior," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(3-4), pages 313-336, June.
    10. Todd Sinai & Nicholas S. Souleles, 2005. "Owner-Occupied Housing as a Hedge Against Rent Risk," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(2), pages 763-789.
    11. Marjorie Flavin & Takashi Yamashita, 2002. "Owner-Occupied Housing and the Composition of the Household Portfolio," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 345-362, March.
    12. Davidoff, Thomas, 2006. "Labor income, housing prices, and homeownership," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 209-235, March.
    13. Steven F. Venti & David A. Wise, 2004. "Aging and Housing Equity: Another Look," NBER Chapters, in: Perspectives on the Economics of Aging, pages 127-180, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Louise Sheiner & David N. Weil, 1992. "The Housing Wealth of the Aged," NBER Working Papers 4115, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Kul B. Bhatia, 1987. "Real Estate Assets and Consumer Spending," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 102(2), pages 437-444.
    16. Ioannides, Yannis M & Rosenthal, Stuart S, 1994. "Estimating the Consumption and Investment Demands for Housing and Their Effect on Housing Tenure Status," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 76(1), pages 127-141, February.
    17. Ermisch, John & Pevalin, David J., 2004. "Early childbearing and housing choices," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 170-194, September.
    18. James Banks & Richard Blundell & Zöe Oldfield & James P. Smith, 2012. "Housing Mobility and Downsizing at Older Ages in Britain and the USA," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 79(313), pages 1-26, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. James Banks & Richard Blundell & Zoë Oldfield & James P. Smith, 2016. "House Price Volatility and the Housing Ladder," NBER Chapters,in: Insights in the Economics of Aging, pages 87-119 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Campbell, John Y. & Cocco, Joao F., 2007. "How do house prices affect consumption? Evidence from micro data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 591-621, April.
    3. Piazzesi, M. & Schneider, M., 2016. "Housing and Macroeconomics," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 1547-1640, Elsevier.
    4. James Banks & Richard Blundell & Zoë Oldfield & James P. Smith, 2010. "Housing Price Volatility and Downsizing in Later Life," NBER Chapters, in: Research Findings in the Economics of Aging, pages 337-379, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Jonathan Halket & Santhanagopalan Vasudev, 2014. "Saving Up or Settling Down: Home Ownership over the Life Cycle," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 17(2), pages 345-366, April.
    6. Jan Rouwendal, 2009. "Housing Wealth and Household Portfolios in an Ageing Society," De Economist, Springer, vol. 157(1), pages 1-48, March.
    7. Charles Himmelberg & Christopher Mayer & Todd Sinai, 2005. "Assessing High House Prices: Bubbles, Fundamentals and Misperceptions," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 67-92, Fall.
    8. repec:esx:essedp:718 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Zan Yang & Ying Fan & Liqing Zhao, 2018. "A Reexamination of Housing Price and Household Consumption in China: The Dual Role of Housing Consumption and Housing Investment," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 56(3), pages 472-499, April.
    10. Amior, Michael & Halket, Jonathan R, 2012. "Do Households Use Homeownership To Insure Themselves? Evidence Across U.S. Cities," Economics Discussion Papers 8963, University of Essex, Department of Economics.
    11. repec:esx:essedp:712 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Halket, Jonathan R & Vasudev, Santhanagopalan, 2012. "Home Ownership, Savings, and Mobility Over The Life Cycle," Economics Discussion Papers 2876, University of Essex, Department of Economics.
    13. Philippe Bracke & Christian Hilber & Olmo Silva, 2014. "Homeownership and Entrepreneurship: The Role of Mortgage Debt and Commitment," CESifo Working Paper Series 5048, CESifo.
    14. Raj Chetty & László Sándor & Adam Szeidl, 2017. "The Effect of Housing on Portfolio Choice," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 72(3), pages 1171-1212, June.
    15. Hochguertel, Stefan & van Soest, Arthur, 2001. "The Relation between Financial and Housing Wealth: Evidence from Dutch Households," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(2), pages 374-403, March.
    16. Nancy van Beers & Michiel Bijlsma & Remco Mocking, 2015. "House Price Shocks and Household Savings: evidence from Dutch administrative data," CPB Discussion Paper 299, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    17. Case, Karl E. & Quigley, John M. & Shiller, Robert J., 2001. "Comparing Wealth Effects: The Stock Market versus The Housing Market," Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt44k6g6vx, Department of Economics, Institute for Business and Economic Research, UC Berkeley.
    18. Case Karl E. & Quigley John M. & Shiller Robert J., 2005. "Comparing Wealth Effects: The Stock Market versus the Housing Market," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-34, May.
    19. François Ortalo-Magné & Sven Rady, 2006. "Housing Market Dynamics: On the Contribution of Income Shocks and Credit Constraints ," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 73(2), pages 459-485.
    20. Bracke, Philippe & Hilber, Christian A.L. & Silva, Olmo, 2018. "Mortgage debt and entrepreneurship," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 52-66.
    21. Davis, Morris A. & Van Nieuwerburgh, Stijn, 2015. "Housing, Finance, and the Macroeconomy," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: Gilles Duranton & J. V. Henderson & William C. Strange (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 753-811, Elsevier.
    22. Markus Haavio & Heikki Kauppi, 2006. "House price fluctuations and residential sorting," 2006 Meeting Papers 774, Society for Economic Dynamics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    downsizing; migration;

    JEL classification:

    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp5173. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.