Changing supply elasticities and regional housing booms

brown house beside tree

Knut Are Aastveit (knut-are.aastveit@norges-bank.no), Bruno Albuquerque (brunoalbuquerque19@yahoo.com) and Andre Anundsen (andre-kallak.anundsen@oslomet.no)

No 844, Bank of England working papers from Bank of England

Abstract: Recent developments in US house prices mirror those of the 1996–2006 boom, but the recovery in construction activity has been weak. Using data for 254 US metropolitan areas, we show that housing supply elasticities have fallen markedly in recent years. Consistent with this, we find that monetary policy shocks have a stronger effect on house prices during the recent recovery than the previous boom. At the same time, building permits respond less. Finally, we find that housing supply elasticities have declined more in areas where land-use regulation has tightened the most, and in areas that experienced the sharpest housing busts.

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:boe:boeewp:0844