Does the DiPasquale-Wheaton Model Explain the House Price Dynamics in China Cities?

The "overheating" of the Chinese housing market in recent years has caught the attention of policy makers, the research community, as well as the general public. Leung and Wang (2007) shows that the qualitative features of the aggregate Chinese housing market are well captured by the DiPasquale-Wheaton (1992) model. This paper estimates a version of the DiPasquale-Wheaton (1994) model with four major Chinese cities: Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Chongqing. It examines the factors which affect the housing price and construction. Policy implications and future research directions are also discussed.