I develop an equilibrium model of housing and default to jointly analyze the effects of bankruptcy and foreclosure policies. Heterogeneous households have access to mortgages and unsecured credit and can default separately on both types of debt. I show that the interaction between foreclosure...

Two recent papers examine the impact of corporate bankruptcy laws on new business start-ups in 29 countries over 1990 - 2008 (Peng et al., 2010; Lee et al., 2010). In this commentary, I briefly point out two significant issues which future researchers might want to consider. First, several countries...

This paper employs spatial econometrics techniques to estimate the impact of bankruptcy regulation on small firm formation. The estimation of the model is computationally challenging due to the joint appearance of a lagged endogenous variable and the unobserved heterogeneity which requires...

To gain understanding on the role of institutional factors on households' demand for risky financial assets, this paper examines empirically the impact of the level of personal bankruptcy provisions in the US. Chapter 7 allows protecting the home equity in bankruptcy up to a certain limit or...

We document the portfolio activity of federal housing agencies and provide evidence on its impact on mortgage markets and the economy. Through a narrative analysis, we identify historical policy changes leading to expansions or contractions in agency mortgage holdings. Based on those regulatory...

France has a long and unique experience of public intervention in household debt restructuring. When facing financial distress, households can file a case to a “households' over-indebtedness commission” (HOC). These HOCs either grant a delay of payment or impose a partial reimbursement of...