The U.S. financial system has changed significantly over the last several decades without any major structural changes to the decentralized financial regulatory system, despite numerous proposals. In the past decade, many countries have chosen to consolidate their regulators into a newly formed...

Using a national loan level data set we examine loan default as explained by local demographic characteristics and state level legislation that regulates foreclosure procedures and predatory lending through a hierarchical linear model. We observe significant variation in the default rate across...

House price volatility; lender and borrow perception of price trends, loan and property features; and the borrower's put option are integrated in a model of residential mortgage default. These dimensions of the default problem have, to our knowledge, not previously been considered altogether...

Because of the recent surge in U.S. personal defaults, Congress is currently debating bankruptcy reform legislation requiring a means test for Chapter 7 filers. This paper explores the effects of such a reform in a model where, in contrast to previous work, bankruptcy options and production are...

We specify and estimate a lifecycle model of consumption, housing demand and labor supply in an environment where individuals may file for bankruptcy or default on their mortgage. Uncertainty in the model is driven by house price shocks, education specific productivity shocks, and catastrophic...