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Australian House Prices: A Comparison of Hedonic and Repeat-sales Measures

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  • James Hansen

    (Reserve Bank of Australia)

Abstract

House prices are intrinsically difficult to measure due to changes in the composition of properties sold through time and changes in the quality of housing. I provide an overview of the theoretical nature of these issues and consider how regression-based measures of house prices – hedonic and repeat-sales measures – can control for compositional and quality change. I then explore whether these regression-based alternatives can provide accurate estimates of pure house price changes in the Australian context. Using unit record data for Australia’s three largest cities – Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane – between 1993 and 2005, the results suggest that the two regression-based approaches provide similar estimates of the pure price change in housing. The measures are comparable in terms of statistical fit, with around half of the variation in prices growth (for those houses sold more than once) explained. The regression-based measures also produce similar estimates of pure price changes to those obtained by a mix-adjusted measure. However, all three measures behave quite differently from a simple median, implying that compositional change matters empirically. These results confirm that regression-based measures are likely to be a useful analytical tool when measuring pure house price changes in Australia.

Suggested Citation

  • James Hansen, 2006. "Australian House Prices: A Comparison of Hedonic and Repeat-sales Measures," RBA Research Discussion Papers rdp2006-03, Reserve Bank of Australia.
    • Handle: RePEc:rba:rbardp:rdp2006-03
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    Cited by:

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    2. Hill, Robert J. & Melser, Daniel & Syed, Iqbal, 2009. "Measuring a boom and bust: The Sydney housing market 2001-2006," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 193-205, September.
    3. Nalini Prasad & Anthony Richards, 2006. "Measuring Housing Price Growth – Using Stratification to Improve Median-based Measures," RBA Research Discussion Papers rdp2006-04, Reserve Bank of Australia.
    4. Ryan Greenaway-McGrevy & Kade Sorensen, 2021. "A spatial model averaging approach to measuring house prices," Journal of Spatial Econometrics, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 1-32, December.
    5. Jéssica Fernanda Castaño Lavado & Miguel Ángel Morales Mosquera, 2015. "Revisión Metodológica de Índices de Precios de la Vivienda," Borradores de Economia 13317, Banco de la Republica.
    6. Yanotti, Maria Belen, 2013. "A review of the Australian mortgage market," Working Papers 2014-01, University of Tasmania, Tasmanian School of Business and Economics, revised 01 Aug 2013.
    7. Dominic Crowley & Shuyun May Li, 2016. "An NPV Analysis of Buying versus Renting for Prospective Australian First Home Buyers," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 92(299), pages 606-630, December.
    8. Luci Ellis, 2006. "Housing and Housing Finance: The View from Australia and Beyond," RBA Research Discussion Papers rdp2006-12, Reserve Bank of Australia.
    9. Nigel Stapledon, 2010. "A History of Housing Prices in Australia 1880-2010," Discussion Papers 2010-18, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    10. Asli Kaya & Ayça Topaloglu Bozkurt & Emine Meltem Bastan & Özgül Atilgan Ayanoglu, 2013. "Constructing a house price index for Turkey," IFC Bulletins chapters, in: Bank for International Settlements (ed.), Proceedings of the Sixth IFC Conference on "Statistical issues and activities in a changing environment", Basel, 28-29 August 2012., volume 36, pages 153-171, Bank for International Settlements.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    house prices; hedonic; repeat-sales;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G12 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Asset Pricing; Trading Volume; Bond Interest Rates
    • R21 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Housing Demand
    • R31 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - Housing Supply and Markets

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