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Foreclosing on opportunity: state laws and mortgage credit

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Author Info
Karen M. Pence
Abstract

Foreclosure laws govern the rights of borrowers and lenders when borrowers default on mortgages. Many states protect borrowers by imposing restrictions on the foreclosure process; these restrictions, in turn, impose large costs on lenders. Lenders may respond to these higher costs by reducing loan supply; borrowers may respond to the protections imbedded in these laws by demanding larger mortgages. I examine empirically the effect of the laws on equilibrium loan size. I exploit the rich geographic information available in the 1994 and 1995 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data to compare mortgage applications for properties located in census tracts that border each other, yet are located in different states. Using semiparametric estimation methods, I find that defaulter-friendly foreclosure laws are correlated with a four percent to six percent decrease in loan size. This result suggests that defaulter-friendly foreclosure laws impose costs on borrowers at the time of loan origination.

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Paper provided by Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.) in its series Finance and Economics Discussion Series with number 2003-16.

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Date of creation: 2003
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Handle: RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2003-16

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Keywords: Mortgages;

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Jones, Lawrence D, 1993. "Deficiency Judgments and the Exercise of the Default Option in Home Mortgage Loans," Journal of Law & Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 36(1), pages 115-38, April.
  2. Clauretie, Terrence M & Herzog, Thomas N, 1990. "The Effect of State Foreclosure Laws on Loan Losses: Evidence from the Mortgage Insurance Industry," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 22(2), pages 221-33, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Gropp, Reint & Scholz, John Karl & White, Michelle J, 1997. "Personal Bankruptcy and Credit Supply and Demand," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 112(1), pages 217-51, February.
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  4. Sandra E. Black, 1997. "Do better schools matter? Parental valuation of elementary education," Research Paper 9729, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
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  5. Lin, Emily Y. & White, Michelle J., 2001. "Bankruptcy and the Market for Mortgage and Home Improvement Loans," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 138-162, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Glenn B. Canner & Wayne Passmore & Elizabeth Laderman, 1999. "The role of specialized lenders in extending mortgages to lower-income and minority homebuyers," Federal Reserve Bulletin, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), issue Nov, pages 709-726. [Downloadable!]
  7. Jack Porter, 2002. "Asymptotic Bias and Optimal Convergence Rates for Semiparametric Kernel Estimators in the Regression Discontinuity Model," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1989, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research. [Downloadable!]
  8. Berkowitz, Jeremy & Hynes, Richard, 1999. "Bankruptcy Exemptions and the Market for Mortgage Loans," Journal of Law & Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 42(2), pages 809-30, October.
  9. Ambrose, Brent W & Capone, Charles A, Jr & Deng, Yongheng, 2001. "Optimal Put Exercise: An Empirical Examination of Conditions for Mortgage Foreclosure," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 23(2), pages 213-34, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Cutler, David M & Glaeser, Edward L, 1997. "Are Ghettos Good or Bad?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 112(3), pages 827-72, August.
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  11. Ambrose, Brent W & Buttimer, Richard J, Jr & Capone, Charles A, 1997. "Pricing Mortgage Default and Foreclosure Delay," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 29(3), pages 314-25, August.
  12. Thomas J. Holmes, 1998. "The Effect of State Policies on the Location of Manufacturing: Evidence from State Borders," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(4), pages 667-705, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. Alston, Lee J, 1984. "Farm Foreclosure Moratorium Legislation: A Lesson from the Past," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(3), pages 445-57, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Markus Frölich & Michael Lechner, 2006. "Exploiting regional treatment intensity for the evaluation of labour market policies," University of St. Gallen Department of Economics working paper series 2006 2006-12, Department of Economics, University of St. Gallen. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  2. Pablo Casas-Arce & Albert Saiz, 2006. "Owning versus leasing: do courts matter?," Working Papers 06-21, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. [Downloadable!]
  3. Anthony Pennington-Cross, 2006. "The duration of foreclosures in the subprime mortgage market: a competing risks model with mixing," Working Papers 2006-027, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
  4. Donald P. Morgan, 2007. "Defining and detecting predatory lending," Staff Reports 273, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
  5. Anthony Pennington-Cross, 2006. "The Value of Foreclosed Property," Journal of Real Estate Research, American Real Estate Society, vol. 28(2), pages 193-214. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  6. Andrew Haughwout & Richard Peach & Joseph Tracy, 2008. "Juvenile delinquent mortgages: bad credit or bad economy?," Staff Reports 341, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
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  7. MacGee, James C., 2006. "Land Titles, Credit Markets and Wealth Distributions," Working Papers RP2006/150, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER). [Downloadable!]
  8. Fröhlich, Markus & Lechner, Michael, 2004. "Regional Treatment Intensity as an Instrument for the Evaluation of Labour Market Policies," CEPR Discussion Papers 4304, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  9. Morris M. Kleiner & Richard M. Todd, 2007. "Mortgage Broker Regulations That Matter: Analyzing Earnings, Employment, and Outcomes for Consumers," NBER Working Papers 13684, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Giang Ho & Anthony Pennington-Cross, 2005. "The impact of local predatory lending laws," Working Papers 2005-049, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. [Downloadable!]
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