Housing tenure and neighbourhood satisfaction in transitional urban China: Evidence from Changchun

Abstract

Housing tenure is widely accepted as an influential factor on neighbourhood satisfaction in developed countries, where tenure choices are largely dichotomous (homeowner or renter) and are subject to market forces. However, in urban China, housing reforms in 1998 have allowed the intersection of both market and institutional forces and created diverse tenure types in the owner-occupied sector, which may have mixed effects on individuals' neighbourhood satisfaction. This study therefore examined neighbourhood satisfaction among owners of four housing tenure types—commodity housing, privatized danwei housing, Economic and Comfortable Housing, and resettlement housing—in Changchun, China. Data for this study came from a city-wide sample of 1,722 homeowners living in 93 neighbourhoods in Changchun and from the Census. The findings show that housing tenure type significantly affects neighbourhood satisfaction. Commodity housing owners are the most satisfied with the determinants of neighbourhood satisfaction resembling those in western countries. However, among the other three government-subsidized homeowner groups, neighbourhood satisfaction levels are affected, although to different extents, by institutional forces. Nuanced results suggest that institutional forces can promote certain owner groups’ neighbourhood satisfaction.