On February 24th, the Nationalökonomische Gesellschaft (NOeG), that is the Austrian Economic Association, awarded Sofie R. Waltl and co-author Anthony Lepinteur its 2020 Young Economist Award. The prize honours the best research presented at the conference by scholars under the age of 35.

The article ‘Tracking Owners’ Sentiments: Subjective Home Values, Expectations and House Price Dynamics’ reveals that home-owners report much higher current values of their homes when they are optimistic about future developments on the housing market. The authors develop new techniques to filter the information inherent in self-reported values of real estate and shows under which circumstances which kind of data is meaningful.

The prize was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Austrian Economic Association (NOeG 2020) on February 24, 2020 at the Vienna University of Economics and Business.