Historic amenities, income and sorting of households

We test the impact of historic amenities on house prices and sorting of households within cities. Conservation area boundaries enable us to employ a semiparametric regression-discontinuity approach to measure the impact of historic amenities. The approach allows for household-specific preferences. Conditional on neighbour attributes, the price difference at the conservation boundary is about 3 percent. Internal historic amenities are also important, as listed houses are about 6 percent more expensive. It is shown that rich households sort themselves in conservation areas and in listed buildings, because they have a higher willingness to pay for historic amenities. The results contribute to an explanation for the substantial spatial income differences within cities.