Residential Mortgage Default Behaviour in Hong Kong

Defaults in residential mortgages could be very costly and hazardous to market stability. This paper sets out to inform homebuyers, lenders and policy makers of the determinants of default, and constructs a mortgage default model to assist them in making mortgage applications, advancing loans, or implementing policies to maintain market stability. Residential default behaviour from 1998 to 2007 is studied and a model is constructed by means of Autoregressive Multiple Linear Regression. The results show that the lag term of default rate, gross mortgage rate, current loan-to-value ratio, change in debt-to-income ratio and Consumer Price Index are positively correlated with default rate; however, property price appreciation and change in the Hang Seng Index have a negative relationship with default rate.