Home ownership as status competition

Abstract

In this paper, we explore the implications of home ownership as a status good for housing prices. More concretely, if a family's housing wealth relative to others is an important sorting variable for relative attractiveness in the marriage market, then competition for marriage partners might motivate people to pursue a bigger and more expensive house/apartment. To test the hypothesis, we explore regional variations in the sex ratio for the pre-marital age cohort across China (as a proxy for differential strength for concerns for status). We find that the evidence is consistent with the status competition hypothesis. Show more