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We examine the impact of housing capital gains on savings behaviour during the 1990s British housing market cycle using microdata from the British Household Panel Survey and county-level house price data. We condition the models on household real financial capital gains using Family Resources Survey data. We find a marginal propensity to consume out of housing wealth of between 0.01 and 0.03, depending on specification. Among our novel findings are asymmetric behaviour between periods of house price rises and falls, with stronger consumption response during periods of house price increases, and a disproportionate impact on saving if the household has negative housing equity.

Individuals exhibiting problems repaying their debt obligations also exhibit much worse psychological health. Selection into problem debt on the basis of poor psychological health accounts for much of this difference. The causality between problem debt and psychological health may be two way. Using individual level UK panel data, local house price movements exogenous to individual households are used to establish the causality from problem mortgage debt to psychological health. In addition, the social norm effects of problem debt are investigated using local bankruptcy and repossession rates. Results indicate there are sizeable causal links and social norm effects in the debt–psychological health relationship.