This paper documents that mortgage servicers increased modification rates by approximately 8 percent for delinquent loans located in a district whose representative was a member of the Financial Services Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives during the 111th Congress. We document that...

We re-examine the methods used in estimating comovements among U.S. regional home prices and find that there are insufficient moments to ensure a normal limit necessary for employing the quasi-maximum likelihood estimator. Hence, we propose applying the self- weighted quasi-maximum exponential...

Financial sophistication does not uniformly impact home ownership decisions. Sophisticated households are less likely to pay too high a mortgage rate and more likely to refinance when financially advantageous to do so but more likely to over pay for a house and less likely to default when...

We empirically analyze pricing of political uncertainty in long-term property rights, guided by a theoretical model of housing assets subject to contract extension in the remote future. To identify exposure to political uncertainty, we exploit a unique variation around land lease extension...

We empirically analyze pricing of political uncertainty in long-term property rights, guided by a theoretical model of housing assets subject to contract extension in the remote future. To identify exposure to political uncertainty, we exploit a unique variation around land lease extension...

Using a novel data set, we study the soft information in subprime mortgages that is not verifiable by a third party, and its relationship with mortgage default. We find that lender effort to collect soft information is intertwined with borrower self-selection into subprime mortgages. We employ...

We empirically analyze the pricing of political uncertainty in long-term property rights, guided by a theoretical model of housing assets subject to contract extension in the remote future. To identify exposure to political uncertainty, we exploit a unique variation around land lease extension...

In this paper we investigate if financially sophisticated households, as measured by schooling and work experience, are less likely to make financial mistakes when buying and owning a home. Surprisingly, we find that financial sophistication does not have a uniform impact across households'...

In this paper a dynamic bi-factor model with Markov-switching is developed to measure and predict turning points. Both common factors have their own cyclical dynamics and their lead-lag relationships are reflected in the transition probabilities matrix. The model is applied to four coincident...