Capital Flows, Real Estate, and Local Cycles: Evidence from German Cities, Banks, and Firms
67 Pages Posted: 9 Mar 2020 Last revised: 14 Apr 2022
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Capital Flows, Real Estate, and Local Cycles: Evidence from German Cities, Banks, and Firms
Capital Flows, Real Estate, and Local Cycles: Evidence from German Cities, Banks, and Firms
Capital Flows, Real Estate, and Local Cycles: Evidence from German Cities, Banks, and Firms
Capital Flows, Real Estate, and Local Cycles: Evidence from German Cities, Banks, and Firms
Date Written: March 2020
Abstract
We study how an aggregate bank flow shock impacts German cities' GDP growth depending on the state of their local real estate markets. Identification exploits a policy framework assigning refugees to cities on a quasi-random basis and variation in non-developable area for the construction of a measure of exposure to local real estate market tightness. We estimate that the German cities most exposed to real estate market pressure grew 2.5-5.0 percentage points more than the least exposed ones, cumulatively, during the 2009-2014 period. Bank flow shocks shift credit to firms with more collateral. More collateral also leads firms to hire and invest more in response to these shocks.
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