with Dionissi Aliprantis and Kristen Tauber

March 2023 Working Paper

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Housing Mobility Programs (HMPs) support residential mobility to reduce economic segregation. One design feature of HMPs requires identifying areas to which moving will most improve outcomes. Recent approaches to identifying neighborhood effects using previous residents' outcomes do not solve the problem of selection bias, but do introduce new econometric problems including lack of support, statistical uncertainty, and time bias. We simulate how this feature and others affect an originally-intended outcome of HMPs: reducing racial segregation. HMP success on this dimension depends on the ability to port vouchers across jurisdictions, access to cars, and the range of neighborhoods targeted.

August 2022 Report

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Eviction filings have largely returned to their prepandemic levels in 2022 after a long period of being below trend. In this Economic Commentary, I describe the trends in eviction filings collected so far during the pandemic and pandemic-era policies aimed at mitigating the damage of the pandemic on housing stability. I show that restrictions on evictions, common early in the pandemic, are associated with lower levels of eviction filings; that recent rent-price growth is associated with higher levels of eviction filings; and that the timing of eviction trends varies in response to the federal emergency rental assistance program in a way that is consistent with the program’s design.

with Dionissi Aliprantis and David Phillips

Journal of Urban Economics, 2022, 129: 103420

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A family can use a housing voucher to move to opportunity only if a landlord in an opportunity neighborhood accepts the voucher. Most landlords in opportunity neighborhoods, though, avoid voucher tenants. We examine a policy change that increases voucher rental payment limits only in high-rent neighborhoods. While the policy induces some new voucher holders to move into high-rent neighborhoods, most landlords do not change their screening behavior in response to the policy. Those landlords who do respond are few and operate at a surprisingly small scale. A sustainable policy of moving to opportunity requires more direct engagement with landlords.

with Rebecca Cowin and Clare Stevens

July 2020 Report

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A family can use a housing voucher to move to opportunity only if a landlord in an opportunity neighborhood accepts the voucher. We examine a policy change that increases voucher rental payment limits only in high-rent neighborhoods. We show that most opportunity landlords avoid voucher tenants and do not change their screening behavior in response to the policy. Those who do respond are few and operate at a surprisingly small scale. Our results suggest that a sustainable policy of moving to opportunity would require more direct engagement with landlords. 

with Andrew Hanson

Regional Science and Urban Economics, 2016, 59: 12-23

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We simulate changes to metropolitan area home prices from reforming the Mortgage Interest Deduction (MID). Price simulations are based on an extended user cost model that incorporates two dimensions of behavioral change in home buyers: sensitivity of borrowing and the propensity to use tax deductions. We simulate prices with both inelastic and elastic supply. Our results show a wide range of price effects across metropolitan areas and prospective policies. Considering behavioral change and no supply elasticity, eliminating the MID results in average home price declines as steep as 13.5% in Washington, D.C., and as small as 3.5% in Miami-Fort Lauderdale, FL. Converting the MID to a 15% refundable credit reduces prices by as much as 1.4% in San Jose, CA, San Francisco, CA, and Washington, D.C. and increases average price in other metropolitan areas by as much as 12.1% (Miami-Fort Lauderdale). Accounting for market elasticities produces price estimates that are on average 36% as large as standard estimates.

with Andrew Hanson

Public Finance Review, 2014, 42(5): 582-607

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Housing market distortions from the mortgage interest deduction (MID) typically focus on a single choice measure such as home size or self-reported amount of debt on a new mortgage. We estimate the amount of mortgage interest deducted on federal tax returns to capture the full range of housing market distortions from the MID. Our primary results show that for every one percentage point increase in the tax rate that applies to deductibility, the amount of mortgage interest deducted increases by US$303 to US$590. Empirical estimates imply elasticities of mortgage interest deducted with respect to the after-tax cost of housing between −0.78 and −1.62, and deadweight loss estimates ranging from 16 to 36 percent of MID tax expenditure.