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Report
Structural change in the mortgage market and the propensity to refinance
We hypothesize that the intrinsic benefit required to trigger a refinancing has become smaller, due to a combination of technological, regulatory, and structural changes that have made mortgage origination more competitive and more efficient. To test this hypothesis, we estimate an empirical hazard model of loan survival for two subperiods, using a database that allows us to carefully control for homeowners' credit ratings, equity, loan size, and measurable transaction costs. Our findings strongly confirm that credit ratings and home equity have significant effects on refinancing probability. ...
Journal Article
Are U.S. reserve requirements still binding?
Paper for a conference sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York entitled Financial Innovation and Monetary Transmission
Journal Article
Mortgage refinancing and the concentration of mortgage coupons
Because of the concentrated distribution of interest rates on outstanding mortgages, modest interest rate declines in 1997 and 1998 made refinancing a smart choice for a record number of homeowners. In addition, the strong economy and the age of mortgage loans likely contributed to the surge in refinancing activity.
Journal Article
Falling reserve balances and the federal funds rate
The growth of "sweeps"--a banking practice in which depository institutions shift funds out of customer accounts subject to reserve requirements--has reduced the required balances held by banks in their accounts at the Federal Reserve. This development could lead to greater volatility in the federal funds rate as banks try to manage their accounts with very low balances. An analysis of the evidence suggests that the volatility of the funds rate is rising slightly, but not enough to disrupt the federal funds market or affect the implementation of monetary policy.
Report
Rational bias in macroeconomic forecasts
This paper develops a model of macroeconomic forecasting in which a forecaster's wage is a function of his accuracy as well as the publicity he generates for his firm by being correct. In the resulting Nash equilibrium, forecasters with identical models, information, and incentives nevertheless produce a variety of predictions, consciously biasing them in order to maximize expected wages. In the case of heterogeneous incentives, the forecasters whose wages are most closely tied to publicity, as opposed to accuracy, produce the forecasts that deviate most from the consensus. We find empirical ...
Journal Article
Credit, equity, and mortgage refinancings
Using a unique loan level data set that links individual household credit ratings with property and loan characteristics, the authors test the extent to which homeowners' credit ratings and equity affect the likelihood that mortgage loans will be refinanced as interest rates fall. Their logit model estimates strongly support the importance of both the credit and equity variables. Furthermore, the authors' results suggest that a change in the overall lending environment over the past decade has increased the probability that a homeowner will refinance.
Report
Effects of household creditworthiness on mortgage refinancings
Using a unique loan level data set that links individual household credit ratings with property and loan characteristics, we test the extent to which homeowners' equity and credit ratings affect the likelihood that mortgage loans will be refinanced as interest rates fall. The logit model estimates strongly support the importance of both the equity and credit ratings affect the likelihood that mortgage loans will be refinanced as interest rates fall. The logit model estimates strongly support the importance of both the equity and credit variable. These results are interesting both from the ...