Fiscal policy, the second factor, may therefore be more important in explaining buoyant prices. In a normal recession, as people lose jobs and their incomes fall, foreclosures drag house prices down—not only by adding to the supply of houses on the market, but also by leaving ex-home-owners with a blemish on their credit history, making it harder for them to borrow again. But this time governments in rich countries have preserved households' incomes. Handouts through wage subsidies, furlough schemes and expanded welfare benefits amount to 5% of GDP. In the second quarter of the year households' disposable incomes in the G7 group of large economies were about $100bn higher than they were before the pandemic, even as jobs disappeared by the millions.

第二大因素是财政政策。财政政策在解释房价上涨上可能更为重要。在正常的经济衰退之下，当人们失去工作、收入下降时，丧失抵押品赎回权会拖低房价——这不仅会增加市场上的房屋供应，还会让前房主的信用记录上留下污点，使他们更难再次贷款。不过这次，发达国家的政府保护了家庭收入，通过工资补贴、休假计划和扩大福利发放的补贴达到了GDP的5%。今年第二季度，尽管有数百万人失去了工作，由大型经济体组成的七国集团(G7)的家庭可支配收入依然比疫情爆发前高出了约1000亿美元，

Other measures directly support the housing market. Spain, for instance, has allowed borrowers to suspend their mortgage repayments. Japan's regulators have asked banks to defer principal repayments on mortgages, and the Netherlands temporarily banned foreclosures. In the second quarter the number of owner-occupied mortgaged properties that were repossessed in Britain was 93% lower than in the same period in 2019, the result of policies that dissuade repossessions. In America foreclosures, as a share of all mortgages, are at their lowest level since 1984.

还有其它一些直接支持房地产市场的措施。例如，西班牙已经允许借款人暂停还贷。日本的监管机构已要求银行推迟偿还抵押贷款的本金。英国第二季度被收回的业主自住抵押房产的数量同比减少了93%，这是劝阻收回房产政策的结果。在美国，丧失抵押品赎回权占所有抵押贷款的比例处于1984年以来的最低水平。