Master's thesis on the impact of natural disaster risk on pricing in the residential real estate market
The main driver is to understand how natural disasters impact residential housing. Such events are characterized by their large destructive force combined with relatively low predictability and rapid onset. Hence, they are somewhat unique compared to risks such as macroeconomic downturns. It is therefore important to study the effects such latent as well as actualized risk has on the housing market and what implications this has for homeowners, investors, insurers, and policymakers.
The central (alternative) hypothesis is that natural disasters have a significant impact on house prices. Existing empirical literature as well as strands of theoretical argumentations suggest that this impact is negative, which might make it sensible to formulate one-sided.
| Source | Data | Link |
|---|---|---|
| Zillow | Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI) | https://www.zillow.com/research/data/ |
| FEMA | Disaster Info | https://www.fema.gov/about/openfema/data-sets#disaster |
| FEMA | National Risk Index | https://hazards.fema.gov/nri/ |
| BLS | Local Area Unemployment Statistics | https://www.bls.gov/lau/ |
| BEA | Local GDP | https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gdp-county-metro-and-other-areas |