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Discussion Paper
The demand for trade credit: an investigation of motives for trade credit use by small businesses
Trade credit--credit extended by a seller who does not require immediate payment for delivery of a product--is an important source of funds for business customers. In 1987, such credit accounted for about 15 percent of the liabilities of nonfarm nonfinancial businesses in the United States, approximately the same percentage of liabilities as these firms' nonmortgage loans from banks. Trade credit apparently is especially important for small businesses: In the same year, it accounted for about 20 percent of small firms' liabilities. ; Businesses that choose to finance their purchases through ...
Working Paper
Mortgage contract choice in subprime mortgage markets
The boom in the subprime mortgage market yielded many loans with high LTV ratios. From a large proprietary database on subprime mortgages, we find that choice of mortgage rate type is not linear in loan sizes. A fixed rate mortgage contract is a popular choice when loan size, measured by LTV ratio, is small. As LTV ratio increases, borrowers become more likely to choose adjustable rate mortgage contracts. However, when LTV reaches a certain level, borrowers start to switch back to fixed rate contracts. For these high LTV loans, fixed rate mortgages dominate borrowers' choices. We present a ...
Working Paper
New Evidence on an Old Unanswered Question : Why Some Borrowers Purchase Credit Insurance and Other Debt Protection and Some Do Not
Credit related insurance and other debt protection are products sold in conjunction with credit that extinguish a consumer?s debt or suspends its periodic payments if events like death, disability, or involuntary unemployment occur. High penetration rates observed in the 1950s and 1960s raised concerns about coercion in the sale of credit insurance. This study presents evidence on credit insurance purchase and debt protection decisions from a new survey. The findings provide little evidence of widespread or systematic coercion in purchases. Instead, findings suggest that risk aversion and ...
Journal Article
Financial characteristics of high-income families
Journal Article
Consumers and debt protection products: results of a new consumer survey
This article presents a number of key findings from a review of the data that mortgage lending institutions reported for 2011 under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA). The article documents home-lending activity reflected in the HMDA data and places the 2011 activity in historical context. It also examines changes in mortgage market concentration in recent years and in the credit scores of recent homebuyers. In addition, the article reviews patterns of lending across different racial or ethnic and income groups and across areas that differ in terms of housing market distress. Finally, it ...