A multi-agent model of urban processes: modelling relocation processes and price setting in housing markets

Abstract

This paper introduces an agent-based micro-simulation model of housingmarketprocesses. The model describes aggregate housingmarket developments, such as price and turnover, as the outcome of households’ decisions to search for a new dwelling, accept an offered dwelling or sell their dwelling. An important feature of the model is that households’ decisions are based on perceptions of housingmarket probabilities. Households update these perceptions based on observed bargaining outcomes in the market. The model was tested in a simulation experiment and appeared to respond plausibly to different marketsettings in terms of prices and households’ perception of the market