The relationship between housing prices and inflation rate in Turkey

Abstract

Purpose Human beings need shelter as the beginning of their existence. Same holds true for people who live in Turkey as it is a cultural and traditional reason to be the host and endeavor to buy a home even if one has to pay the debt for years. Another factor that is important for individuals and even for countries is the inflation rate. In this context, the purpose of this study is to investigate whether the 26 regions of Turkey are affected by the inflationary pressure, specifically in the housing price index (HPI). Design/methodology/approach For this purpose, data from 2010:01 to 2019:01 and the consumer price index (CPI), as well as HPI have been used. The causal relationship between the variables is analyzed by Konya Causality (2006) test. Findings The key results suggest that HPI causes inflationary pressures in some regions. Research limitations/implications The study has some limitations in terms of data set and scope. These are as follows: although there are many variables affecting housing prices, this study aims to investigate the causal link between inflation and housing prices. In addition, only the CPI and HPI variables were provided on a monthly basis in the 2010-2019 period for 26 regions due to the aim of making regional propositions in the investigation of this relationship. For these reasons, different macroeconomic variables could not be studied. Originality/value This study makes the following contribution to the literature. While the majority of existing literature investigates the relationship between housing prices and inflation from an empirical perspective for country, very few studies have been for the sub-regions and also these studies have focused on only some sub-regions. In other words, in the literature review, a study has observed that Turkey has to examine the relationship between the housing price and inflation variables for all sub-regions in particular. To overcome this deficiency in the literature, this study aims to investigate the relationship between housing price and inflation for 26 regions.