Does crime in parks affect apartment prices?

A park is a desirable feature when people are purchasing a property. Buyers are ready to pay more for properties surrounded by natural amenities, such as a pleasant park. However, if a park is targeted by crime and disorder, then it may have a negative effect on people's appraisal. The aim of this study is to reach a better understanding of how parks and crime rates affect housing prices taking into account residential properties and parks type. Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, is used as the case study. The methodology has two stages. An extensive field work was performed in a selected number of parks to help characterize the parks in Stockholm. This information was gathered with secondary data about parks using Geographic Information System. This pre-assessment was later followed by the analysis of 2008s apartment sales using hedonic modelling to assess the effect of parks alone and in combination with crime rates. Results suggest that the effect of parks on prices vary by park type (increased with, e.g. features of cultural and national interest and decreased with ball games or boating facilities) while an aggregated measure of parks lowers overall apartment prices. More interestingly, findings show that the price of apartments tends to be discounted in areas where parks have relatively high rates of violence and vandalism.