Housing price forecastability: A factor analysis

We examine US housing price forecastability using a common factor approach based on a large panel of 122 economic time series. We find that a simple three-factor model generates an explanatory power of about 50% in one-quarter ahead in-sample forecasting regressions. The predictive power of the model stays high at longer horizons. The estimated factors are strongly statistically signi?cant according to a bootstrap resampling method which takes into account that the factors are estimated regressors. The simple three-factor model also contains substantial out-of-sample predictive power and performs remarkably well compared to both autoregressive benchmarks and computational intensive forecast combination models.