Housing Price Inflation, Family Growth, and the Move from Rented to Owner Occupied Housing

Abstract

This paper uses data from Annual Housing Surveys to investigate the relationship between growth in family size and the move from rented to owner occupied housing in the mid and late 1970s. A series of studies conducted in the 1950s and 1960s established that growth in the size of the family triggered moves from rented to owner occupied housing. Changes in house price inflation during the 1970s may have altered the social and economic conditions associated with a move from rented to owner occupied housing. Log-linear analyses of data from the 1974 and 1978 Annual Housing Surveys indicate that, while growth in the size of a renter's family continued to predict the purchase of owner occupied housing in 1978, the composition of the purchasing group changed significantly between 1974 and 1978, with childless couples increasing and households with children decreasing. The declines in the latter group occurred primarily among poorer households. The implications of these changes for the life cycle - housing cycle model of residential mobility are explored.