"A salient feature of the recent U.S. recession is that output and employment have declined more in regions (states, counties) where household leverage had increased more during the credit boom. This pattern is difficult to explain with standard models of financing frictions. We propose a theory...

Following the evidence that housing costs may impair the proper functioning of the labour market, this paper develops a search and matching model where trading frictions in the mortgage, housing and labour markets interact with each other. Precisely, the employment status affects the probability...