House Price Bubble Detection in Ukraine

The purpose of this paper is to build a framework for the assessment of the fundamental value of house prices in the largest Ukrainian cities, as well as to identify the thresholds, the breach of which would signal a bubble. House price bubbles are detected using two approaches: ratios and regression analysis. Two variants of each method are considered. We calculate the price-to-rent and price-to-income ratios that can identify a possible over- or undervaluation of house prices. Then, we perform regression analyses by considering individual multi-factor models for each city and by using a pooled OLS model with panel data. The only pronounced and prolonged period of a house price bubble is the one that coincides with the Global Financial Crisis. The bubble signals produced by these methods are, on average, simultaneous and are in accordance with economic sense.