Housing is one of the most expensive goods people buy in their lifetime. As it is one of the most expensive goods, people tend to take various considerations in making housing type and tenure choices and the final choice is heavily dependent on the bu...
Housing is one of the most expensive goods people buy in their lifetime. As it is one of the most expensive goods, people tend to take various considerations in making housing type and tenure choices and the final choice is heavily dependent on the buyer’s priorities. Relative price, price expectation, and the government’s housing policy are factors considered in making housing type and tenure choices, and accounting for these factors heavily influences the final decision the buyer makes.
This paper hypothesizes that relative price, the government’s housing policy, and price expectation are the main factors in housing type and tenure choices and thoroughly analyzes their effect in the buyer’s decision-making. The scope of analysis is from 2011 to 2014 in Seoul Metropolitan area and 6 metropolitan cities. The paper largely takes two dependent variables in analysis. One being tenure choice; own versus lease with deposit. And the other being housing type choice; apartment versus non-apartment housing. The data is acquired from 2014 A Research on the Actual Housing by Korea Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport. The explanatory variable data in each analysis is acquired from Korea Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport’s 2014 Research on the Actual Housing and Housing Market Price. Utilizing the above mentioned data restrictions upon each household was converted. The price expectation variable takes two cases into account; the myopic price expectation and the rational price expectation. Empirical analysis is conducted using the binary logistic model and the nested logistic model.
First, the analysis of tenure type choices shows that relative price and the restrictions placed on each household represented as LTV and DTI has an negative effect on household’s tendency to own housing. On the other hand, permanent income and the myopic price expectation has a positive effect. This reflects that when a household decides on its tenure type, the larger the buying price to lease ratio, the more probable the household chooses to lease. As for the LTV and DTI restriction, the larger the restriction the more probable the household chooses to lease. In the case of price expectation, the statistically significant myopic price expectation means that the house buyer considers housing as not only as a place to live but as an investment for future profit.
In the housing type analysis, the relative price between apartment and non-apartment housing had a negative effect in selecting an apartment. The rational price expectation had a positive effect in choosing the apartment as a housing type. Different from the tenure type analysis, the rational price expectation is statistically significant. This implies that households that chose to reside in an apartment predicts apartment price based on not past price fluctuation but on rational price expectation model.
In the nested logit analysis used to investigate the order of housing type and tenure choices, statistically significant variable differed depending on what choice came first. For the households that own housing, only the rational price expectation has a positive effect on the probability to choose an apartment. For households that leases, the buying price to lease ratio has a negative effect on the probability to choose an apartment. This means that once a household chooses to own housing, relative price between owning and leasing is not considered. For the case of households that lease, however, relative price between owning and leasing is statistically significant.
For the households that choose apartment as housing type, relative price between owning and leasing, restriction from DTI have a negative effect while rational price expectation and myopic price expectation have a positive effect. For the households that choose non-apartment as housing type, relative price between owning and leasing, restriction from LTV and DTI have a negative effect while myopic price expectation has a positive effect on probability to own housing. This means when households choose housing type as a priority housing consumers consider relative price between owning and leasing.
Finally, the analysis of whether households consider housing type and tenure type as a priority, the average error of tenure type priority selection nested logit model was smaller than that of housing type priority selection, thereby implying that tenure type priority selection explains the observations better. The method used in the paper to explain the priority of housing type and tenure type is not a verified method. However, the fact that this paper uses statistical model and the average of an observational error to see which decision come first has significance.
To summarize the research conducted, in making housing type and tenure choices, relative price between alternatives is an important factor accounted in making a decision. The government’s financial regulations that places restriction on households play an important role in the household’s tenure type choices and the price expectation variable show that housing consumers consider housing as an investment. This result shows that consumers consider relative price between alternatives and the government’s financial regulations play a major role on decision-making and households consider housing a place to dwell.
Also, the statistically significant price expectation variable implies that consumers see housing both as an investment and a place to live. In the nested logit analysis where one can see the factors considered regarding which choice is make first, households consider different factors according to the decisions made first.
This research implies that when the government makes policies for invigoration of housing business, it needs to consider the fact households consider housing as an investment and more specifically, policy needs to be differentiated on the type of housing to be transacted. The research also has a significant meaning in that it is a first to analyze the consumer’s decision making process, and proposes a directivity in the making of a housing policy.
However, the fact the prices used in the relative price variable are estimated, lace of consideration for past housing is the limit of the research. Lastly, the research investigated the order of decision making in housing type and tenure choices. However the method used is not orthodox. Therefore, another method is to be used in the analysis, it will give direction to future government’s housing policy.