Working Papers
Return on investment in supporting homeownership: Evidence from French interest-free loan policy
with Jean-Sauveur Ay and Julie Le Gallo (submitted)
This article estimates the impact of subsidised loans for new homeownership on the number of new homeowners (extensive margin), housing choices (intensive margin), and dwelling prices (capitalization effect). Our identification relies on the spatial and temporal variation of the French interest-free loan policy over the last decade, controlling for confounding assignment through a spatial semi-parametric propensity score. Our doubly robust results cannot rule out that the policy has no effect at the extensive margin, while it has significant intensive margin and capitalization effects. By considering a wide range of different policy objectives in terms of extensive and intensive margins, we compute the returns to government spending for counterfactual policy schemes and credit market conditions. Our simulations suggest that for reasonable values of policy objectives, increasing public spending has a return on investment lower than one, and may even be negative in some situations.
Capitalisation of Demand-side Policies with Information Asymmetries and Market Segmentation
I consider the price capitalisation of demand-side policies in the context of segmented housing market with heterogeneous purchasers according to information level on the housing market. Empirically, I exploit the French policy which subsidise buy-to-let investments through tax cuts. To account for endogenous treatment assignment following a place-based policy design, I apply a difference-in-difference approach for successive policy removal and introduction. The segmentation definition I consider follows the one assumed by policymakers, i.e. according to tenure status and building type. Exploiting micro-data available from the tax register, I distinguish the price effect experienced by local purchasers (who are assumed to be perfectly informed and thus subject only to the demand-shifting channel) from that experienced by Out-Of-Town purchasers (with lower level of knowledge of the housing market). The findings indicate that i) subsidy is at least partly capitalised on the targeted segments ii) there is no effect on segment defined by owner-occupation iii) information asymmetries of OOT purchasers play a minor role to explain price increase (only 1 point).
new version coming soon
Spatial Sorting and Housing Wealth Persistence: Insights from the Universe of French Homeowners
with Jean-Sauveur Ay, Julie Le Gallo and Olivier Dupré
This article studies the relationship between initial levels and subsequent changes in gross housing wealth. Using administrative microdata on housing ownership and transactions in France over the period 2011-2019, we impute a market value for all housing portfolios held by private homeowners. We document strong housing wealth persistence (HWP) for this population, particularly with respect to the location of the main residences. We then examine HWP for three sub-populations identified from the panel structure of our data. HWP appears to be mainly driven by homeowners who change their main residence or receive a housing inheritance, while it is less pronounced for homeowners with a constant housing portfolio. The spatial sorting operated by the location choices of main residences (both between and within commuting zones) appears to be a key determinant of HWP, rather than capital gains from price variations of given housing portfolios.
version available upon request
Only winner or loser? Purchase price difference based on portfolios’ size
with Antoine Peris and Laure Casanova Enault
version coming soon
Work in progress
Homeowners Response to Transmission Tax Reform: Evidence from France with Bluebery Planterose
Unpublished
The Dynamics of Property Ownership with Spatial Markets and Policies
PhD Manuscript, link