Housing investment: Long run international trends and volatility

Using long-run data for today's advanced economies, the pattern of housing investment is examined from the 19th century to the present day. Housing in vestment is shown to be subject to long cycles, the most pronounced of whic h were in the post-1945 era. Since 1970 the trend of housing investment has been fiat for most countries considered, and falling as shares of national income. Fluctuations in housing investment demand may have helped to stabi lise the world economy during the 1950s and 1960s but since then have switc hed to become a destabilising factor.