 Exploring the rise of mortgage borrowing among older AmericansJ. Michael Collins, Erik Hembre and Carly Urban Regional Science and Urban Economics, 2020, vol. 83, issue C Abstract: Between 1980 and 2015, older households in the US more than tripled the use of home mortgage debt. Rather than using owned homes as a source of imputed rent, older households are borrowing against home equity, with loan terms that exceed their expected life spans. Using several data sources, we explore the rising use of mortgages among elderly homeowners. Rising mortgage borrowing provides low-wealth older households with increased liquid assets, but it does not appear to be meaningfully associated with increases in loan defaults. This trend of elderly mortgage borrowing is not explained by increasing levels of income or cohort demographic shifts, but is linked to a rise on ownership of homes by older households in general. However, changes in subsidies associated with mortgage debt partially contribute to differential increases in mortgage use by older households. Keywords: Mortgages; Homeownership; Retirement; Personal Finance (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:regeco:v:83:y:2020:i:c:s0166046219300808 DOI: 10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2020.103524 Access Statistics for this article Regional Science and Urban Economics is currently edited by D.P McMillen and Y. Zenou More articles in Regional Science and Urban Economics from Elsevier |
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