Para garantizarle una navegación por nuestra web segura y de calidad, le informamos que utilizamos Cookies. Si está de acuerdo clique ACEPTAR. Puede bloquear o eliminar las cookies instaladas en su equipo mediante la configuración de las opciones del navegador. Para más información consulte nuestra Política de Cookies
Acepto
Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas

Publications

Constraints on LTV as a Macroprudential Tool: A Precautionary Tale
García-Montalvo, J. and J. M. Raya
Source: Oxford Economic Papers
Abstract
The introduction of limits or regulatory penalties on high LTV ratios for residential mortgages is one of the most frequently used tools of macroprudential policy. The available evidence seems to indicate that this instrument can reduce the feedback loop between credit and house prices. In this paper, we show that these constraints on LTV ratios, used by Spanish banking regulators before the onset of the housing crisis of 2008, did not prevent that feedback loop. In the Spanish case, the fact that appraisal companies were mostly owned by banks led to a situation in which the LTV limits were used to generate appraisal values adjusted to the needs of the clients, rather than trying to appropriately represent the value of the property. This tendency towards over-appraisals produced important externalities in terms of a higher than otherwise demand for housing, and intensification of the feedback loop between credit and house prices.
Recommended citation

García-Montalvo, J. and J. M. Raya (2018): “Constraints on LTV as a Macroprudential Tool: A Precautionary Tale”, Oxford Economic Papers, 70(3), July, pp. 821-845.

View article