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Power Laws in Real Estate Prices? Some Evidence

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  • Blackwell, Calvin

Abstract

Power law distributions have previously been observed in data like city-size distributions (Zipf’s Law), income distributions, and financial asset prices. In this paper, we explore the distribution of real estate prices in Charleston County, South Carolina. We fit power law, lognormal and exponential distributions to the data and compare the goodness of fit among the distributions. We find that the best fit distribution lies somewhere between the lognormal and power law distributions. We estimate how the power law exponent changes over time and find a potential relationship between the shape of the power law distribution and the bursting of the real estate bubble in 2007.

Suggested Citation

  • Blackwell, Calvin, 2018. "Power Laws in Real Estate Prices? Some Evidence," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 90-98.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:quaeco:v:69:y:2018:i:c:p:90-98
    DOI: 10.1016/j.qref.2018.03.014
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    Cited by:

    1. Takaaki Ohnishi & Takayuki Mizuno & Tsutomu Watanabe, 2019. "House Price Dispersion in Boom-Bust Cycles: Evidence from Tokyo," Working Papers on Central Bank Communication 008, University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Economics.
    2. Robert Sinclair & Jess Diamond, 2022. "Basic food and drink price distributions transcend time and culture," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-7, December.
    3. Takaaki Ohnishi & Takayuki Mizuno & Tsutomu Watanabe, 2020. "House price dispersion in boom–bust cycles: evidence from Tokyo," The Japanese Economic Review, Springer, vol. 71(4), pages 511-539, October.
    4. Takaaki Ohnishi & Takayuki Mizuno & Tsutomu Watanabe, 2019. "House Price Dispersion in Boom-Bust Cycles: Evidence from Tokyo," CARF F-Series CARF-F-461, Center for Advanced Research in Finance, Faculty of Economics, The University of Tokyo.
    5. D'Acci, Luca S., 2023. "Is housing price distribution across cities, scale invariant? Fractal distribution of settlements' house prices as signature of self-organized complexity," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Real Estate; Power law; Pareto distribution; Complexity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R10 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - General
    • R31 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - Housing Supply and Markets

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