I test the credit-market effects of housing wealth shocks by estimating the consumption elasticity of house price shocks among households in different age quintiles. Younger households face faster expected income growth and hence would like to borrow more than older households. I estimate consumption elasticities from housing wealth by age quintile to be {4; 0; 3; 8; 3} percent. As predicted by theory, the youngest group has a higher elasticity of consumption than the next two age quintiles. That the consumption of the age quintile on the verge of retirement is responsive to housing wealth is also not surprising: I show that these households are likeliest to "downsize" their house and thus realize any capital gains.
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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.:
Jonathan S. Skinner, 1996.
"Is Housing Wealth a Sideshow?,"
NBER Chapters,
in: Advances in the Economics of Aging, pages 241-272
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
[Downloadable!]
Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas & Jonathan A. Parker, 2002.
"Consumption Over the Life Cycle,"
Econometrica,
Econometric Society, vol. 70(1), pages 47-89, January.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
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