The effects of a shopping mall on housing prices : a case study in Hangzhou

Abstract

There are few studies on the externalities of shopping malls affecting the housing market. This study aims to discuss two issues: (1) What is the intensity of the impact of a shopping mall? (2) When does the external influence of a shopping mall begin to reveal itself? The West Intime Shopping Mall in Hangzhou offers a unique situation to research the questions. By dividing the study area into nine blocks, using hedonic price theory, and the price gradient approach with housing price data from 2011 to 2015, we found that in the space dimension, the mall exerted a significantly positive effect on the housing prices of nearby blocks. With the increase in distance from the mall, the positive effect decreased. There were more significantly positive effects in blocks far away from the city center. In the time dimension, the effects of West Intime did not reveal themselves until the mall had started to operate and gradually matured over time, implying that the mall did not have the obvious expected impact on housing prices before the mall had begun operating.