Research

Working papers

• Build at your own risk. Integrating natural hazards into land use regulations [New draft coming soon!]
  [Solo-authored]
  Abstract

  Insurance coverage provides little incentive for households to adapt their dwellings to the natural risks to which they are exposed. This paper studies the housing market impacts of regulations that limit development in at-risk areas and mandate protective building norms. Using a novel national dataset and variation in the timing and spatial scope of policy implementation, I provide evidence that these regulations initially strongly limit new housing supply, but the long-term decrease in quantities is modest as the supply elasticity increases. I further show that with full insurance coverage, households do not value adaptation but still negatively value living in risky locations, which evidences risk aversion against natural hazards.

  
  

• Mayors strike back: Evidence from upzoning in France (Available here)
  with Guillaume Chapelle and Camille Urvoy
  Abstract

  To address rising housing prices, national governments have increasingly sought to relax local land use rules through “upzoning” reforms. Yet the effectiveness of such top-down policies remains uncertain. This paper examines the impact of a reform in France that abolished floor area ratios (FAR) from unique zoning data in the Paris Urban area. We exploit within-municipality variation in pre-reform FAR coverage through a difference-in-differences strategy. We show that local governments responded by tightening other regulatory tools, such as maximum heights and building coverage ratios, and increasing permit refusals. These countervailing responses undermined the deregulatory intent of the reform, resulting in negligible effects on real estate markets. Our findings highlight the political and institutional limits of central government efforts to override local zoning decisions.

  
  

• The other half of the market. Multifamily land and the measurement of urban land values in France [Working paper available upon demand]
  with Guillaume Chapelle, Arthur Lemoine, Alain Trannoy, and Etienne Wasmer
  

• What is France worth ? Residential land value estimates [Working paper available upon demand]
  with Guillaume Chapelle, Arthur Lemoine, Alain Trannoy, and Etienne Wasmer
  

Work in progress

• A Giant with Feet of Clay: insurance, building standards, and risk capitalization
  with Sacha Nass

• New construction in declining areas: Housing depreciation, historical protection, and urban center decline
  with François Lafont

• Optimal spatial household allocation through the natural risk exposure lense \ with Sophie Cêtre