The Unassuming Economist

From the IMF’s latest report on Thailand:

On cross-country:

• Book: Housing Policy, Wellbeing and Social Development in Asia – Taylor & Francis Group
• Conference: National Housing Conference – Canada Mortgage Housing Corporation
• Southern European housing policies: a legislative regulation perspective – Universidade Autónoma de Lisboa

On the US:

• Leaning Against Housing Prices as Robustly Optimal Monetary Policy – NBER
• Why Don’t House Price Growth and Inflation Move in Tandem? – Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis
• Help wanted: Home builders need women, immigrants and robots to fill shortage – MarketWatch
• Where the House-Price-to-Income Ratio Is Most Out of Whack – Citylab
• Mortgage Interest Deduction Reform Worked; Sky Isn’t Falling – Cato Institute
• How Student Debt Can Ruin Home Buying Dreams – New York Times
• Quest for Affordable Housing Drives People Away From the Coasts – Pew Charitable Trusts
• Alexandria, Virginia Gets Housing Affordability Wrong – Cato Institute

On other countries:

• [Australia] Seven Charts That Show Why Australia’s Housing Boom Is Ending – Bloomberg
• [Australia] Chinese property investment in Australia plummets – Financial Times
• [Australia] Inquiry into increasing affordable housing supply: Evidence-based principles and strategies for Australian policy and practice – Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute
• [Canada] Determinants of housing prices: evidence from Ontario cities, 2001-2011 – Emerald Insight
• [Canada] Canada’s ‘Unprecedented’ Reliance on Housing Fuels Recession Call – Bloomberg
• [Canada] Bank of Canada Seen on Hold Amid Trade Uncertainty, Housing Slowdown – Wall Street Journal
• [China] China’s Toughest Housing Curbs Test Limits of Speculative Buyers – Bloomberg
• [Hungary] Property prices boom in Budapest – Financial Times
• [Korea] Housing investment, default risk, and expectations: Focusing on the chonsei market in Korea – Regional Science and Urban Economics
• [Netherlands] Amsterdam Bets on Social Housing to Beat Soaring Prices – Bloomberg
• [Rwanda] How can the mismatch in housing supply be addressed? – The New Times
• [South Africa] Cape Town Rocked by Protests as Poor Communities Demand Housing – Bloomberg
• [United Arab Emirates] Why affordability is the new buzzword in Dubai real estate – JLL
• [United Kingdom] Will London Ever Get Affordable Housing? – Bloomberg
• [United Kingdom] UK Housing Review 2018 – UK Housing Review

Photo by Aliis Sinisalu

From the IMF’s latest report on Qatar:

From the IMF’s latest report on Colombia:

The latest IMF report on the Netherlands says that:

• “In sum, apart from the conventional fundamental demand and supply factors, the interaction of various institutional and structural factors seems to have contributed significantly to high and rapidly rising house prices in the Netherlands. The large direct and indirect subsidies for social housing and the highly regulated rental market is likely skewing housing needs and use in the Netherlands. The coexistence of a well-developed mortgage market and large tax preferences for owner-occupied housing and mortgage debt seems to have further fueled the surge in demand for homeownership and household debt. In addition, the sluggish response of housing supply exacerbated the situation by failing to cushion the impact of demand pressures.”

• “Overvalued house prices and elevated household debt are a source of vulnerability in the Netherlands in view of the importance of the housing market to both financial and macroeconomic stability. The recent house-price cycle left the Netherlands with elevated level of household debt and a significant share of underwater mortgages. While households have started to deleverage gradually from the record debt levels over the past years, a large correction of house prices, driven by slower real income growth, a reverse in sentiment, or interest rate hikes could weaken household balance sheets further and depress private demand, and in turn adversely affect corporate and bank earnings.”

• “The authorities have been vigilant about the risks and have introduced a series of measures to target the owner-occupied housing sector and strengthen the resilience of banks and households, including additional bank capital buffer requirements in line with Basel III/CRD IV, an introduction of LTV and debt service-to-income (DSTI) caps since 2013, a gradual reduction of LTV limit for mortgages to 100 percent by 2018, a tax exemption for gifts used for housing down payments or mortgage repayments, allowing MID only for new fully amortizing loans, and a gradual reduction of the maximum tax rate allowed for MID from 52 percent in 2013 to 38 percent in 2042 in steps of ½ percent per year.”

• “Nevertheless, further and comprehensive reforms are needed to address the risks from the housing market and enhance the macro-financial resilience of the economy. A stable housing market (without pronounced boom-bust cycles) would contribute to smoother economic development. It is critical that policies work together to fundamentally address housing market imbalances that pose risks to stability and growth and hinder labor mobility:”