AEA Papers and Proceedings
ISSN 2574-0768 (Print) | ISSN 2574-0776 (Online)
Affordability of Owner-Occupied Housing across US Cities
AEA Papers and Proceedings
vol. 114,
May 2024
(pp. 340–45)
Abstract
This paper compares the affordability of owner-occupied housing across US cities. We apply a new method for imputing the rental value of owner-occupied housing developed in Diamond and Diamond (2024) that accounts for unobserved house quality. On average, the rental value of owner-occupied housing is 3.2 percent above that implied by standard hedonic methods. Hedonic methods overestimate rental value of owner-occupied housing in the most regulated cities and sharply underestimate it in the least regulated cities. We provide suggestive evidence that this heterogeneity reflects misallocation, where high-quality housing stock cannot be built in the most desirable parts of regulated cities.Citation
Diamond, Rebecca, and William Diamond. 2024. "Affordability of Owner-Occupied Housing across US Cities." AEA Papers and Proceedings, 114: 340–45. DOI: 10.1257/pandp.20241045Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- G51 Household Finance: Household Saving, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth
- R21 Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics: Housing Demand
- R31 Housing Supply and Markets