An assessment of the risk and return of residential real estate

Abstract

Purpose – The home is a substantial investment for most individual investors but the assessment of risk and return of residential real estate has not been well explored yet. The existing real estate pricing literature using a CAPM-based model generally suggests very low risk and unexplained excess returns. However, many academics suggest the residential real estate market is unique and standard asset pricing models may not fully capture the risk associated with the housing market. The purpose of this paper is to extend the asset pricing literature on residential real estate by providing improved CAPM estimates of risk and required return. Design/methodology/approach – The improvements include the use of a levered β which captures the leverage risk and Lin and Vandell (2007) Time on Market risk premium which captures the additional liquidity risk of residential real estate. Findings – In addition to presenting palatable risk and return estimates for a national real estate index, the results of this paper suggest the risk and return characteristics of multiple cities tracked by the Case Shiller Home Price Index are distinct. Originality/value – The results show higher estimates of risk and required return levels than previous research, which is more consistent with the academic expectation that housing performs between stocks and bonds. In contrast to most previous studies, the authors find residential real estate underperforms based on risk, using standard financial models.