• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.43 no.3
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• pp.392-411
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• 2008

The purpose of this paper is to develop a method for exploring hotspot patterns of house price volatility where there is a high fluctuation in price and homogeneity of direction of price volatility. These patterns are formed when the majority of householders in an area show an adaptive tendency in their decision making. This paper suggests a method that consists of two analytical parts. The first part uses spatial scan statistics to detect spatial clusters of houses with a positive range of price volatility. The second part utilizes local Moran's I to evaluate the homogeneity of direction of price volatility within each cluster. The method is applied to the areas of Gangnam-Gu, Seocho-Gu, and Songpa-Gu in Seoul from August to November of 2003; the Participatory Government of Korea designated these areas and this period as the most speculative. The results of the analysis show that the area around Gaepo-Dong was as a hotspot before the Government's anti-speculative 10.29 policy in 2003; the house prices in the same area stabilized in October, 2003 and the area was identified as a coldspot in December, 2003. This case study shows that the suggested method enables exploration of hotspot of house price volatility at micro spatial scales which had not been detected by visual analysis.