It’s widely accepted in the real estate finance world that student debt can significantly lower someone’s buying power when they go to purchase a new home. But a new paper has quantified how much, at a time when home prices in Massachusetts continue to spiral upwards, and its authors argue the results have implications for closing the racial wealth gap.

A new research paper by the National Association of Realtors’ Vice President of Demographics and Behavioral Insights Jessica Lautz and Nottingham Trent University Professor Michael White found that buyers who had student debt purchase homes that were 18.8 percent less expensive than those without student debt from January 2014 to December 2017, controlling for home characteristics and the income of the home buyer.

The effects can be far-reaching, the authors say.

“A buyer seeking a home that is priced 18.8 percent less may look to a completely new city, seek a home in a different metro area or rural area which may not provide the same employment prospects. These limited job prospects may make it difficult to pay off student debt,” Lautz and White wrote.

During the same period, Lautz and White found, Hispanic and Black Americans purchased homes 11.2 percent and 10.6 percent less expensive, respectively, than white Americans when controlling for household income, home size, location and down payment help from family.

The effect, the authors argue, is to potentially lock people with high student debt loads and minority homebuyers out of the same generational wealth accumulation that their better-off, white peers have access to as home values rise over time.