House price volatility in China: A pervasive pattern with geographic disparity

Abstract

The booming real estate sector has been regarded as the “gray rhino” risk emerging in China over the past decade. Yet, the house price volatility per se has not been thoroughly examined. Filling the gap in the literature, this paper explores the house price volatility and its determinants for 70 large and medium-sized cities in China, using an extensive monthly data set from 2005 to 2019. We find evidence of significant geographical disparities in both the GARCH effects and the best-fitted volatility specification. Significant GARCH effects are found in 57 cities, among which 40% of cities show a persistent volatility pattern. We also find that both the house price volatility pattern and the associated volatility value are affected significantly by education and healthcare amenities.

Keywords

• house price
• geographic disparity
• volatility
• GARCH
• model selection
• China