spb/wp9_uqo Public

1% Author: Simon-Pierre Boucher — contact@spboucher.ai2% ============================================================================3% UQO Working Paper No. 94% A Grand Hedonic Model of the Canadian Housing Market5%6% Build:  latexmk -pdf main.tex   (or `make` in this directory)7% Figures are read from ../figures/, tables from ../results/tables/.8% ============================================================================9\documentclass[12pt,letterpaper]{article}1011% ---------------------------------------------------------------- encoding12\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}13\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}14\usepackage[english]{babel}1516% ---------------------------------------------------------------- layout17\usepackage[letterpaper,margin=1in]{geometry}18\usepackage{setspace}19\onehalfspacing2021% ---------------------------------------------------------------- typography22\usepackage{mathptmx}23\usepackage{microtype}2425% ---------------------------------------------------------------- math26\usepackage{amsmath,amssymb,amsthm}2728% ---------------------------------------------------------------- tables29\usepackage{booktabs}30\usepackage{threeparttable}31\usepackage{makecell}3233% ---------------------------------------------------------------- figures34\usepackage{graphicx}35\usepackage{subcaption}36\graphicspath{{../figures/}{./}}3738% ---------------------------------------------------------------- captions39\usepackage[font=small,labelfont=bf,labelsep=period,justification=justified,singlelinecheck=false]{caption}4041% ---------------------------------------------------------------- colours & links42\usepackage[dvipsnames]{xcolor}43\usepackage[colorlinks=true,linkcolor=NavyBlue,citecolor=NavyBlue,urlcolor=NavyBlue,breaklinks=true]{hyperref}4445% ---------------------------------------------------------------- bibliography46\usepackage[authoryear,round,semicolon]{natbib}47\bibliographystyle{aer}4849% ---------------------------------------------------------------- headings & lists50\usepackage{titlesec}51\titleformat{\section}{\large\bfseries}{\thesection.}{0.5em}{}52\titleformat{\subsection}{\normalsize\bfseries}{\thesubsection.}{0.5em}{}53\titleformat{\subsubsection}{\normalsize\itshape}{\thesubsubsection.}{0.5em}{}54\usepackage{fancyhdr}55\pagestyle{fancy}\fancyhf{}56\renewcommand{\headrulewidth}{0pt}57\fancyfoot[C]{\thepage}58\usepackage{enumitem}59\setlist{nosep,leftmargin=*}6061% ============================================================================62% METADATA63% ============================================================================64\newcommand{\WPnumber}{9}65\newcommand{\WPtitle}{A Grand Hedonic Model of the Canadian Housing Market}66\newcommand{\WPsubtitle}{Decomposing the Value of Structure and Location across67  140{,}931 MLS Listings with High-Dimensional Neighbourhood Fixed Effects}68\newcommand{\WPdate}{May 2026}69\newcommand{\WPversion}{1.2}70\newcommand{\WPkeywords}{Hedonic pricing, Housing markets, Canada, Fixed effects,71  Spatial heterogeneity, Automated valuation}72\newcommand{\WPjel}{R31, R21, C21, C55}7374\newcommand{\WPauthor}{Simon-Pierre Boucher}75\newcommand{\WPaffiliation}{D\'epartement des sciences administratives\\76  Universit\'e du Qu\'ebec en Outaouais}77\newcommand{\WPemail}{simon-pierre.boucher@uqo.ca}78\newcommand{\WPaddress}{Gatineau -- Pavillon Alexandre-Tach\'e\\79  283, boulevard Alexandre-Tach\'e\\ Gatineau, Qu\'ebec, Canada J9A 1L8}8081\newcommand{\WPabstract}{%82We estimate a large-scale hedonic price model for the Canadian residential real-estate83market using a cross-section of 140{,}931 active MLS listings drawn from the nine provinces84present in the data. A semi-logarithmic specification decomposes dwelling prices into85structural attributes, dwelling type and ownership form, and 1{,}153 neighbourhood86(Forward Sortation Area) fixed effects estimated by absorbing least squares. Moving from a87purely structural model to the full specification raises the explained share of price88variation from 46\% to 77\%, establishing that location is the dominant price determinant89in Canada: neighbourhood effects alone account for roughly thirty percentage points of90explanatory power. The living-area elasticity is 0.51--0.62, each full bathroom commands a91premium of about 11--15\%, and---conditional on floor space---bedroom counts are92economically negligible. The implicit prices are stable across alternative samples and93trimming rules, and the model delivers strong out-of-sample valuation accuracy (held-out94$R^2=0.76$; median absolute error of 16\%). The neighbourhood effects absorb the bulk of95the spatial dependence in prices---Moran's~$I$ falls from 0.46 to 0.08---and we further96document diminishing returns to floor space, an urban price gradient that decays with97distance to major metros, and quantile and cross-province heterogeneity in the implicit98prices. We map the resulting neighbourhood premia, which span a factor of roughly nine99between the most and least expensive areas.}100101\begin{document}102103\input{sections/titlepage}104105\setcounter{page}{1}106\input{sections/introduction}107\input{sections/literature}108\input{sections/data}109\input{sections/methodology}110\input{sections/results}111\input{sections/robustness}112\input{sections/discussion}113\input{sections/conclusion}114115\newpage116\bibliography{references}117118\end{document}119