Title: Housing equity as a buffer
Description: "The decision to extract home equity is examined using household-level data for the United  Kingdom, 1993 to 2003. At its peak during the period, around one in ten homeowners withdrew  equity per year. The paper finds that the equity withdrawal decision conforms to predictions from  the standard life-cycle framework and models that predict its use as a financial buffer. The paper  also estimates responses to the large house price appreciation and significant reductions in  mortgage rates seen during the period. This has implications for the size of the 'collateral  channel' and credit channel models of monetary policy."--Bank of England web site.