The Impact of Economic Policy Uncertainty on Investment in Real Estate Corporations Based on Sustainable Development: The Mediating Role of House Prices

Abstract

Since the COVID-19 outbreak, the global economy has undergone profound changes, and China’s real estate market has experienced dramatic turbulence. In order to stabilise the national economy during the epidemic, China’s macro-controls on the real estate industry have become more frequent. These regulatory policies have kept the uncertainty in China’s economic policies at a high level for almost two years. Therefore, in order to further regulate the real estate market and thus establish a sustainable macro-control mechanism, the purpose of this study is to provide the necessary practical research and policy basis for the real estate market by exploring how economic policy uncertainty and house prices affect the level of corporate investment in real estate development. Based on the theory of real options, financial friction theory and real estate characteristics theory, this paper studies the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and the investment level of real estate developers and further explores the mediating role of house prices. This paper selects the panel data of Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share real estate listed companies in the CSMR database from the first quarter of 2012 to the fourth quarter of 2022 and uses the fixed-effects regression method to identify the following conclusions. Firstly, stronger economic policy uncertainty promotes the investment level of real estate corporations; secondly, the fluctuation of house prices plays a mediating role in the positive effect of economic policy uncertainty on the investment of real estate corporations.