Impact of Remittance Income on House Prices: Evidence from Bangladesh

During the past three decades, the Bangladesh economy has been characterized by higher economic growth, and record levels of remittance income from both foreign and domestic sources. By using household data, and ordinary least squares (OLS) and quantile regressions, this study explores the factors that affect house prices in Bangladesh. Particular attention is given to the role of domestic and foreign remittance incomes. The results reveal that both domestic and foreign remittance incomes have positive and significant effects on housing prices in Bangladesh. The results from this study indicate that house prices and estimated prices of housing attributes may reflect the fact that housing attributes are not priced the same across a given distribution of house prices. Furthermore, the quantile regression shows that unlike the single OLS estimate, parameter estimates differ along the distribution of house prices per square feet.