The Unassuming Economist

Working papers and conferences:

• How Should Monetary Policy Respond to Housing Inflation? – Minneapolis Fed
• What does housing collateral mean for Hong Kong economy? From the perspective of modelling and policy implication – Economic Analysis and Policy
• The Geographical Spillover Effect of a House Purchase Deregulation Policy: Evidence from a Quasi-Experiment in China – SSRN
• When Does Land Use Regulation Lower the Average Price of Housing in Cities? – SSRN
• Pricing for Opportunity: The Impact of Spatially Varying Rent Subsidies on Housing Voucher Neighborhoods and Take-up – SSRN
• A Structural Model of Mortgage Offset Accounts in the Australian Housing Market – SSRN

On the US—developments on house prices, rent, permits and mortgage:    

• Runaway Rents in Big American Cities. Rents are rising quickly in some big cities – Home Economics
• U.S. Home Prices Hit Record in June for Second Consecutive Month. Home sales slowed again, ending a disappointing spring selling season – Wall Street Journal
• Record house prices depress US home sales in June – Reuters
• Home Price Growth Expected to Moderate as Listings Outpace Sales. Forecast of New Home Sales Downgraded, Existing Home Sales Upgraded – Fannie Mae
• NAR Real Estate Forecast Summit – NAR
• Will home prices drop in 2024? Even as buyer demand has slowed, extremely low supply has kept home prices from falling. Prices increased a bit in 2023, and they’ll probably go up in 2024, as well. Most major forecasts predict that home prices will end 2024 between 2% and 4.8% higher than the year before. – Business Insider
• Housing market predictions 2024: What homebuyers should know. In 2024, homebuyers can expect high home prices and slightly lower mortgage rates later in the year. Hopeful buyers should start preparing as early as possible by saving money and improving their credit. Look into affordable mortgage programs and down payment assistance to boost affordability. – Business Insider  
• When Will the Housing Market Crash? Economists Don’t Foresee It in 2024. Experts overwhelmingly say that the housing market isn’t going to crash anytime soon. The last housing crash helped cause today’s lack of supply, which is what’s keeping prices from falling. Mortgage rates, however, are expected to fall this year. This will help make homeownership more affordable. – Business Insider
• NMHC: “Apartment Market Conditions Continue to Loosen”. Leading indicator for Rents and Apartment Vacancies suggests more weakness for Apartments – Calculated Risk
• NAR: Existing-Home Sales Decreased to 3.89 million SAAR in June. Median House Prices Increased 4.1% Year-over-Year – Calculated Risk
• Existing Home Sales Continued to Pull Back Amid Record High Prices – NAHB
• New Home Sales Decrease to 617,000 Annual Rate in June. Median New Home Price is Down 9% from the Peak – Calculated Risk
• Profit Margins for U.S. Home Sellers Mostly Unchanged During Second Quarter Despite Renewed Price Spike – ATTOM
• There’s a shift happening in some housing markets—just look at inventory. Florida and Idaho join Texas in hitting pre-pandemic inventory milestones—and some other states aren’t too far behind. – Fast Company
• Watch Months-of-Supply! – Calculated Risk

On the US—other developments:    

• Housing and the American Worker – AEI
• Soaring Cost of Insurance and Property Tax Is the Top Risk for Triggering Mortgage Delinquencies, Survey Finds – Realtor.com
• Secret #69 – NAR Considers Landlord-Ownership to be “Home Ownership” – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #70 – What You Can Do to Increase Home Ownership – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #71 – Congress Almost Prevented 500,000 Foreclosures but the Financial Industry Stopped Them – Real Estate Decoded
• Secret #72 – Most Developers Today Don’t Want to Build Inexpensive Houses. They Want to Build More Profitable Houses – Real Estate Decoded
• The Cost of Luxury Homes in Every State – Yahoo Finance
• Mercatus Center Study Documents Progress on Housing Reform. Many states have enacted laws curbing exclusionary zoning and other regulations that block new housing construction. – Reason
• Lessons In Working With Institutional Real Estate Firms. Eight hard-won lessons from a decade working with 110+ of the largest global real estate owners and operators – Thesis Driven

On China:

• China’s Long Blueprint for Economy Falls Short on Details, Raising Concerns. Leadership in Beijing signals commitment to near-term growth, but leaves questions on entrenched debt and property problems – Wall Street Journal
• China Vows to Accelerate New Affordable-Housing Model. Steps up commitment to promote renting along with buying. Event also signals further loosening of home-buying measures – Bloomberg
• China’s Cement Boom Is Over. We Can All Breathe Easier. The industry’s collapse will lead to a more balanced economy, as well as a healthier planet. – Bloomberg
• China’s housing may get extra help by July’s end as policymakers strive to reverse slump. Policymakers, concerned about weak domestic demand, may ‘step up easing rhetoric and measures’ at this month’s Politburo meeting, Goldman Sachs says – South China Morning Post

On other countries:  

• [Australia] NSW to trial prefabricated ‘modular homes’ to address housing crisis. Premier Chris Minns says announcement ‘an important milestone in our work to utilise nontraditional methods of delivering more homes sooner’ – The Guardian
• [Canada] Homebuyer FOMO Starts to Pump Up Canada’s Real Estate Market. Lower rates helped spur more sales, higher prices in June. ‘When the tide turns, and it will, it will turn fast’ – Bloomberg
• [Hong Kong] Give Hong Kong private developers more incentives to join subsidised housing scheme: analysts. Experts also urge authorities to restore market confidence following failed first land bid under Private Subsidised Sale Flat Pilot Scheme – South China Morning Post
• [Jamaica] Jamaica’s Residential Property Market Analysis 2024 – Global Property Guide
• [Korea] Koreans Expect Hotter Housing Market in Worry for Central Bank. Bank of Korea wants to avoid rate cut sign fueling home prices. Overall consumer confidence rises and inflation outlook eases – Bloomberg
• [Panama] Panama’s Residential Property Market Analysis 2024 – Global Property Guide
• [Russia] How Vladimir Putin created a housing bubble. Prices have risen by 172% in Russia’s biggest cities over the past three years – The Economist
• [Singapore] Singapore to Introduce New Open-Plan Public Housing Layout – Bloomberg
• [Slovenia] Housing market challenges and policy options in Slovenia – OECD
• [Spain] The housing shortage – BBVA
• [Spain] Reasons behind the scarce supply of housing. Since 2021 housing starts have been lower than homes created. Factors that could limit housing supply include a shortage of land ready to start new developments, regulatory uncertainty and labor shortages. Measures are needed to boost residential construction and rental supply. – BBVA
• [United Kingdom] Nimby Wastelands Are Holding Britain Back. To solve its housing shortage, England needs to puts its grey and unpleasant land to use. – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] Nationwide first big lender to offer sub-4% mortgage deal in months. Rate will only be available to buyers and not customers switching home loan products – FT
• [United Kingdom] Fixed-rate mortgages below 4% back on sale in UK. Brokers hope Nationwide’s mortgage deal is sign of ‘summer of savings’ for homebuyers – The Guardian
• [Vietnam] Vietnam’s Residential Property Market Analysis 2024 – Global Property Guide

Links to the week’s top housing market stories.

Cross Country

• Steady Rise In House Prices Points To Growth In Confidence – Forbes
• The UK’s Broken Housing Market – Policy Exchange
• Slash stamp duty for pensioners to boost housing market, Reeves urged – The Telegraph
• Rising House Sale Prices in Greece Outpace Most of Europe, Eurostat Reports – Greek City Times
• China new home prices fall at fastest pace in 9 years, more support needed – Reuters
• China June new house prices -4.5% y/y (prior -3.9%) – Forexlive

US

• The Best Plan for Housing Is to Plan Less – New York Times
• Part 2: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-July 2024 – CalculatedRisk
• 3rd Look at Local Housing Markets in June – CalculatedRisk
• Gentrification as a housing problem – Works in Progress
• Are YIMBYs Wrong about the Housing Crisis? – Aziz Sunderji
• Household Wealth Gains Are a Tailwind to Consumer Spending – Apollo.com
• Secret #66 – The Housing Wealth Effect is a Double-Edged, Lopsided Sword – John Wake
• Housing Finance Watch (Weeks 27 & 28, 2024) – American Enterprise Institute
• REMODELING SPENDING TO TICK UP THROUGH MID-YEAR 2025 – Harvard JCHS
• Here’s why international buyers are pulling way back from the U.S. housing market – CNBC
• US housing market is turning more buyer-friendly – Yahoo Finance

A list of papers that study the economic effects of rent control

1. Housing market spillovers: Evidence from the end of rent control in Cambridge, Massachusetts – Autor, Palmer, and Pathak (2014)
2. The effects of rent control expansion on tenants, landlords, and inequality: Evidence from San Francisco – Diamond, McQuade, and Qian (2018)
3. Robbing Peter to pay Paul? The redistribution of wealth caused by rent control – Ahern and Giacoletti (2022)
4. Rent control effects through the lens of empirical research: An almost complete review of the literature – Kholodilin (2024)

Links to the week’s top housing market stories.

Cross Country

• Canada’s Housing Market Starts to Strengthen After Rate Cut – Bloomberg
• Canada real estate: Home prices continue to rise despite slumping sales, says Royal LePage – Yahoo Finance
• Are We in a Housing Bubble in 2024? – Norada Real Estate Investments
• The Most Splendid Housing Bubbles in Europe: Biggest Price Drops in Germany, Finland, Sweden, Austria, France, Denmark – Wolf Street
• Vietnam’s Residential Property Market Analysis 2024 – Global Property Guide

US

• Better news on housing construction plus a methodological improvement pushes up the forecast – The Nowcast (and other thoughts on the economy)
• A Discussion of the Housing Market with Lance Lambert (ResiClub) – CalculatedRisk Newsletter
• Home Insurance Rates in America Are Wildly Distorted. Here’s Why – New York Times
• NAHB Urges Congress to Address Housing Affordability Crisis – NAHB
• Rate cuts won’t fix housing affordability, economist says – Yahoo Finance
• Florida is bucking the national housing trend, real estate firm says – Fox Business
• America’s most livable small cities revealed, with locals loving their reasonable housing costs, plentiful jobs and great amenities – Daily Mail
• Could policies solve US housing affordability crisis? – MPA Mag

Links to the week’s top housing market stories.

Cross Country

• Investment in UK student housing climbs 245 per cent to record high – Yahoo Finance
• Germany’s Urban Housing Recession Is Coming to an End – Bloomberg
• House prices and rents rose between Q4 2023 and Q1 2024 – Eurostat
• Hong Kong’s talent pass program drives up housing rents – Nikkei Asia
• China’s property bust won’t be fixed without the intervention of the state – East Asia Forum

US

• The Geography of Housing Affordability – Aziz Sunderji
• Six Lessons from Six Months of Thesis-Driven Courses – Paul Stanton and Brad Hargreaves
• When will the housing market crash again? – Yahoo Finance
• These Fast-Growing Florida And Texas Cities Have 2024’s Slowest Housing Markets—Here’s Why – Forbes
• Housing Market Predictions For 2024: When Will Home Prices Be Affordable Again? – Forbes
• Current mortgage rates as of July 4, 2024 – Fortune
• Want to buy or sell a home? How to get a 3% mortgage rate, negotiate fees, and more – USA Today
• Real Estate Experts Say These Will Be the Best US Cities To Buy Property in the Next 5 Years – Yahoo Finance
• Housing Market Entering ‘Crash Stage’ in Multiple Cities – Newsweek
• These 15 housing markets have the highest correction risks – Fox News