The transition to markets dominates the development agenda of the 1990s. Financial sector reforms are central to a successful transition to a market economy. The author focuses on one dimension of these reforms: the development of housing finance institutions and services. He presents a progress...

The peak of the first global real estate boom was reached around 1990 in most Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries. Asset inflation was massive: in office markets across Europe, capital values rose 400 percent between 1980 and 1990, accelerating after 1986 -...

The transformation of the planned economies of central and eastern Europe to market economies has focused on economic stabilization and liberalization, privatization, and financial sector development. The housing sector and the mortgage market have been factors in each of these processes but not...

Problems of developing financial services for housing are acute in transitional socialist economies. The authors examine contractual savings for housing (CSH), which are often advocated as a primary solution, especially in Central and Eastern European countries. A CSH instrument links a phase of...