U-M Professor of Economics Frank Stafford and U-M post-doctoral researcher Bing Chen released a study looking at the relationship between the financial behavior of households and their stock market participation, specifically how that behavior was influenced by housing consumption commitments such as a mortgage.

According to the authors of “Stock Market Participation: Family Responses to Housing Consumption Commitment,” the article examines “direct stock ownership with a focus on dynamics and the connection to mortgage holding and mortgage payments between 2005-7 and then 2007-9.” They were especially interested in discovering the type of family who opened a stock account in conjunction with holding a mortgage in 2005-7. Then as the financial crisis hit, 2007-9, they met mortgage commitments by selling off and exiting the stock market - adding to the downward pressure on equity prices.

Read their findings in, “Stock Market Participation: Family Responses to Housing Consumption Commitments.”