Availability of Lee-Carter Model in Housing Market Analysis

Abstract

In this analysis, we compared Lee-Carter (LC) model and VAR model to confirm the availability of LC model in the forecast of housing market using the data of apartment transaction volume, and then evaluated the forecast accuracy by comparing the actual values with the forecasted values from LC model and VAR model. According to the results of this analysis, it appeared that the LC model was not inferior to VAR model in the forecast accuracy. In the additional analysis, the univariate time series forecasting models such as AR model or ARCH model also could not show superior results to LC model. LC model is expected to be used usefully in the field of housing market because the structure of LC model is simple and the estimating process is easy as well as it has similar forecast accuracy compare to different models. Meanwhile, different from VAR model, the sum of forecasted values of all 16 area estimated by using LC model was almost the same as the forecasted total values estimated by the univariate model. In this viewpoint, the LC model also has its merits compared to different models when we use the forecasted apartment transaction volume in the business practice.