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Impact Of Wildfires And Floods On Property Values: A Before And After Analysis

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  • WASANTHA ATHUKORALA

    (Department of Economics and Statistics, Faculty of Arts, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka)

  • WADE MARTIN

    (#x2020;Department of Economics, California State University, MS 4607, Long Beach, CA 90840-4607, USA)

  • PRASAD NEELAWALA

    (#x2021;School of Economics and Finance, QUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, QLD 4001, Australia)

  • DARSHANA RAJAPAKSA

    (#x2021;School of Economics and Finance, QUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, QLD 4001, Australia)

  • CLEVO WILSON

    (#x2021;School of Economics and Finance, QUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, QLD 4001, Australia)

Abstract

One of the most evident casualties of a natural disaster is the property market. The private and social costs from such events run into millions of dollars. In this paper, we use a unique dataset to examine the impact on residential house prices affected by natural disasters using a hedonic property (HP) values approach. For this purpose, we use data before and after a wildfire and floods from Rockhampton in central Queensland, Australia. The data is unique because one suburb was affected by wildfires and another was affected by floods. For the analysis, three suburbs namely Frenchville, Park Avenue and Norman Gardens are used. Frenchville was significantly affected by wildfires in the latter part of 2009 and to a lesser extent in 2012, while Park Avenue was affected by floods at the end of 2010, January 2011–2013. Norman Gardens, which was relatively unaffected, is used as a control site. This enables us to examine the before and after effects on property values in the three suburbs. The results confirm that soon after a natural disaster property prices in affected areas decrease even though the large majority of individual houses remain unaffected. Furthermore, the results indicate that the largely unaffected suburb may gain immediately after a natural disaster but this gain may disappear if natural disasters continue to occur in the area/region due to the stigma created. The results have several important policy decision and welfare implications which are briefly discussed in the paper.

Suggested Citation

  • Wasantha Athukorala & Wade Martin & Prasad Neelawala & Darshana Rajapaksa & Clevo Wilson, 2016. "Impact Of Wildfires And Floods On Property Values: A Before And After Analysis," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 61(01), pages 1-23, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:serxxx:v:61:y:2016:i:01:n:s0217590816400026
    DOI: 10.1142/S0217590816400026
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    1. Athukorala, Wasantha & Martin, Wade & Wilson, Clevo & Rajapaksa, Darshana, 2019. "Valuing bushfire risk to homeowners: Hedonic property values study in Queensland, Australia," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 44-56.
    2. Hein, Walter & Wilson, Clevo & Lee, Boon & Rajapaksa, Darshana & de Moel, Hans & Athukorala, Wasantha & Managi, Shunsuke, 2019. "Climate change and natural disasters: Government mitigation activities and public property demand response," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 436-443.
    3. Abbie A. Rogers & Fiona L. Dempster & Jacob I. Hawkins & Robert J. Johnston & Peter C. Boxall & John Rolfe & Marit E. Kragt & Michael P. Burton & David J. Pannell, 2019. "Valuing non-market economic impacts from natural hazards," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 99(2), pages 1131-1161, November.
    4. Rajapaksa, Darshana & Gono, Marcel & Wilson, Clevo & Managi, Shunsuke & Lee, Boon & Hoang, Viet-Ngu, 2020. "The demand for education: The impacts of good schools on property values in Brisbane, Australia," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    5. Darshana Rajapaksa & Wasantha Athukorala & Shunsuke Managi & Prasad Neelawala & Boon Lee & Viet-Ngu Hoang & Clevo Wilson, 2018. "The impact of cell phone towers on house prices: evidence from Brisbane, Australia," Environmental Economics and Policy Studies, Springer;Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies - SEEPS, vol. 20(1), pages 211-224, January.
    6. Rajapaksa, Darshana & Zhu, Min & Lee, Boon & Hoang, Viet-Ngu & Wilson, Clevo & Managi, Shunsuke, 2017. "The impact of flood dynamics on property values," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 317-325.

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