We employ detailed internet search data to examine price and liquidity dynamics of the Dutch housing market. We show that the number of clicks on properties listed online proxies demand and the number of listed properties proxies supply. From this internet search behavior, we create a market tightness indicator and we find that this indicator Granger causes changes in both house prices and housing market liquidity. The results of a panel VAR suggest that a demand shock results in a temporary increase in liquidity and a permanent increase in prices in urban areas. This is in accordance with search and matching models.

A common definition of liquidity in real estate investment is the ability to sell property assets quickly at full value, as reflected by transaction volume. The present paper makes methodological and conceptual contributions in the study and understanding of liquidity. First, we extend the Fisher et al. (2003, 2007) methodology for the separate tracking of changes in reservation prices on the demand (potential buyers) and supply (potential sellers) sides of the asset market. We show how to apply the methodology to a repeat sales indexing framework, allowing application to typical commercial property transaction price datasets, which lack appraisal valuations or complete data regarding property characteristics. We also use a Bayesian, structural time series approach to estimate the indexes. These methodological enhancements enable much more granular supply and demand index estimation, including at the metropolitan level. Second, we propose a Liquidity Metric based on the indexes, and show that the normal liquidity dynamic in commercial property asset markets is "pro-cyclical", that is, price and trading volume tend to move together, with demand tending to lead supply. But we also observe an "anomalous" dynamic that occurs about 25 percent of the time, in which the Liquidity Metric declines while consummated prices are still rising. This anomalous dynamic is often associated with the end of a period of rapid growth in market values.

We examine co-movements in private commercial real estate index returns and market liquidity in the US (apartment, office, retail) and for eighteen global cities, using data from Real Capital Analytics over the period 2005–2018. Our measure of market liquidity is based on the difference between supply and demand price indexes. We document for all analyzed markets much stronger commonalities in changes in market liquidity compared to commonalities in real price index returns. We further provide empirical evidence that space markets are less integrated than capital markets by analyzing co-movements in net-operating-income and cap rate spreads (over similar maturity bond yields). In a theoretical simulation model, we show that the strong integration of capital markets compared to space markets, is in fact the reason why market liquidity co-moves so strongly compared to returns. Our results are of interest for large private real estate investors such as pension funds and other institutional investors who are interested in spreading risk. Our findings imply that fully diversified price return benefits may be difficult to obtain, because market liquidity may dry up in all markets simultaneously, which makes portfolio re-balancing more difficult and costly.