Unaffordable Housing Research Articles

The Doomed Pursuit of Dignity: Artists as Property Guardians in and Against Artwashing

This paper discusses the role of artists engaged in live-work property guardian schemes and their potentials to act in a dignifying way at sites of struggle over the regeneration of council housing in London. To gain this understanding, I will describe how artists are embedded in this context by looking at the interaction between artists and property guardian enterprises working on housing estates in London. I will critically examine the artist role through the lance of artwashing critical method, namely allyship of the art world with the real estate industry in the process of social cleansing of housing estates in the UK. Following this, I will discuss the potential of artists to act in a dignified way, drawing on interviews with artists that have lived as property guardians. I will talk about the frustration of artists that stems from their circumstances, namely torn between the necessity to survive within an unaffordable housing market in London and the wish to make art in an uncompromised way. Studying the instrumentalization of artists employed by real-estate industry property guardian enterprises and the artists' attempts to resist this instrumentalization is vital for any understanding of the recent mutations in the capitalist management of housing and art and vital for the attempt to establish new sites of artistic urban struggle for housing justice. Article received: April 20, 2021; Article accepted: June 21, 2021; Published online: September 15, 2021; Original scholarly paper

The impact of Airbnb on housing affordability: Evidence from Hong Kong

Recent years have witnessed the rapid expansion of the home-sharing business. The home-sharing services provided by Airbnb not only allow the homeowner to earn extra income by renting out part of the property to the potential renters but also provides the renters an authentic travel experience by living with residents. The emerging business model of Airbnb may bring about some uncertainties to rental housing markets. This study aims to explore an important issue – whether the home-sharing services provided by Airbnb would exacerbate the problem of housing affordability in Hong Kong. By examining the data from multiple sources such as the website of Airbnb and Census statistics from the Hong Kong Government, and housing rental transactions from property agents’ website via several econometric methods, we found that (1) the arrival of Airbnb would drive up housing rent rate around 3.6–4%; (2) The Airbnb activities would increase the rent-to-income ratio by 4%–4.7% in Hong Kong; (3) short-term home-sharing provided by Airbnb under current circumstance would lead to housing unaffordability in Hong Kong. It is suggested that regulations/guidelines on home-sharing should set a quota or limit the number of offering from long-term rentals to short-term rentals.

Building more housing near transit: A spatial analysis of residential densification dynamics

Although building more housing near transit has gained increasing popularity as a strategy for addressing housing unaffordability while promoting sustainability, the effectiveness of this strategy has remained unclear, particularly in auto-oriented metropolises where land use planning authority largely rests with local governments. This article provides an analysis of how parcel-level residential land use intensification takes place under the influence of public transit expansion, with explicit attention to the interactions between current and planned land use changes, in a five-county Southern California region. The analysis using a generalized structural equation modeling approach shows that residential properties are more likely to be densified in transit-rich areas. This tendency is detected not only in the existing high-quality transit areas but also in locations where transit services will be available in the future. It is also found that relaxing zoning restrictions increases the probability of parcel-level densification, and the resultant density increase can induce further zoning or plan changes in nearby areas.

'That house was a home': Qualitative evidence from New Zealand on the connections between rental housing eviction and poor health outcomes.

Eviction, or a forced move from rental housing, is a common experience for New Zealand renters, yet we know very little about its effects. This research investigated how eviction affects people's lives and health. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 27 people who had experienced eviction. We coded the transcripts and grouped them into themes using template analysis. Participant experienced grief at the loss of the home. Moving out and searching for a new home was highly stressful on participants and on their relationships. After being evicted, people became homeless, often staying with family and friends and lived in poor quality or unaffordable housing. They reported health issues as a result of these circumstances. Eviction harms health through causing stress, grief and a move to a risky living situation. Increasing the supply of housing and funding wide-ranging support services can help minimise the harm caused by eviction. SO WHAT?: Reducing the incidence and impact of eviction should be a priority for health promotion.

Impact of changes in housing tenure and affordability status on depressive symptoms: Evidence from a longitudinal study

IntroductionHousing is an important social determinant of health. We investigated effects of changes in housing tenure and affordability on depressive symptoms. MethodsData of 9,956 individuals aged >20 years from the Korea Welfare Panel Study (2015–2020) were analyzed. Housing tenure was categorized as homeowners or tenants. Individuals with housing-related expenditures exceeding 30% of household income were defined as having housing unaffordability. Analyses using generalized estimating equations were conducted to evaluate the relationship between changes in housing tenure and affordability on depressive symptoms measured with the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. ResultsIndividuals who became tenants (β = 0.326, p = 0.027) or were persistent tenants (β = 0.542, p<0.001) demonstrated significantly more severe depressive symptoms than persistent homeowners. Individuals with new (β = 0.562, p < 0.001) or consistent housing unaffordability (β = 1.032, p = 0.036) showed increased depressive symptoms compared with those with persistent housing affordability. Depressive symptoms were reduced in new homeowners and those who left housing unaffordability status (β = -0.807, p = 0.031). The interaction between housing tenure and affordability on depressive symptoms differed by age and household composition. Housing tenure at post-retirement age and single-person households were associated with a decrease in depressive symptoms, respectively. LimitationsAll housing-related factors, especially different domains of housing insecurity including unstable neighborhoods or reasons for moving, have not been identified. ConclusionsChanges in housing tenure, affordability, and the two combined were significantly associated with depressive symptoms. Furthermore, the degree of interactive effect varied among age groups and household composition. Housing welfare policies that can stabilize housing tenure and affordability might help prevent depression.

Housing insecurity experiences and coping strategies of single‐mother families in Australia: An Internet‐mediated research

AbstractHousing has broader implications for families. Single mother families face many difficulties that make them more susceptible when encountering housing problems. By analyzing the content of a single mother Facebook group, this article describes a variety of housing insecurity issues experienced by single mother families in Australia, including unaffordable housing, struggles in the private rental market, high mobility, and homelessness. We observed some risk factors and protective factors at both individual level and structural level that intersect and mediate single mother families’ experiences of these housing insecurity issues. A multidimensional framework is applied to analyze the complexity and fluidity of these factors. Psychosocial and group‐based interventions can help single mother families manage stress and improve their adaptation to some housing insecurity issues. However, mountain‐moving efforts to tackle structural problems are central and urgent to address these issues and to support single mothers and their children.

Dynamics of affordability and immigration in the Canadian housing market

PurposeThis study aims to make two major contributions. First, given the literature gap in housing unaffordability for different immigrant groups in Canada, it makes an essential contribution to the literature. To the best of the knowledge, this study is the first study of its kind to examine housing unaffordability by examining different immigrant groups. Second, differences in unaffordability can help understand the decline in welfare, as it can have financial implications and a negative impact on health outcomes. Third, this study’s findings are valuable for policy formulation to improve immigrant integration and ease the housing unaffordability crisis.Design/methodology/approachThis study examines the determinants of housing affordability to investigate differences among various immigrant groups in Canada. A bivariate logit model using public microdata from the Canadian census estimates the determinants of moderate and severe unaffordability. Additionally, the separation of tenants and owners provides insights into the dynamics of unaffordability. The results show significant differences between immigrant groups with higher levels of unaffordability among Asian immigrants. The insights can help devise and implement housing assistance programs to address the challenges arising from the post-COVID-19 pandemic phase.FindingsThe results indicate that unaffordability declines with increasing age, education and full-time employment. Gender dynamics are evident, with women faring worse than men regarding the likelihood of extreme housing unaffordability. Households face a greater likelihood of unaffordability in more populous provinces and larger census metropolitan areas that struggle with the high cost of living, racial disparities and low income. Immigrants, especially from Asia, Africa and the Middle East, continue to struggle with chronic and severe unaffordability issues. The impact is much more severe for those renting, exemplifying the strain it is taking on the financial health of recent immigrants.Originality/valueGiven the literature gap in housing unaffordability for different immigrant groups in Canada, it makes an essential contribution to the literature. To the best of the knowledge, this study is the first study of its kind to examine housing unaffordability by examining different immigrant groups.

The unequal geography of declining young adult homeownership: Divides across age, class, and space

AbstractAcross countries, the position of young adults on the housing market has worsened over the past decade. Young adults’ decreasing access to homeownership has garnered particular attention. Most studies analysing young adults’ housing market entry focus on micro‐level determinants or national‐level patterns and trends. This paper adds an important perspective by focusing on spatial variations within a single country, unravelling pronounced inter‐municipal differences in homeownership across age and class. Our case is the Netherlands, where we use full‐population register data for the 2011–2018 period to analyse spatial patterns and trends using a range of quantitative spatial methods. Our findings highlight a notable decrease in owner‐occupancy among young adults in the Netherlands over the period. Such overall declines, however, belie clear class divisions, with decreases particularly concentrated among low‐income young adults. Untangling spatial dynamics reveals both important geographic commonalities and clear divergences. Declining young homeownership was found across 87% of municipalities, suggesting a common experience. Analyses also reveal stark spatial disparities, with the strongest decreases in the most urbanised regions, particularly large cities. Spatially divergent patterns of housing market exclusion are furthermore highly classed: widespread among young adults with a low income, while more spatially concentrated among those with a high income. Finally, using advanced spatial regression modelling, we explore municipal characteristics, revealing how local housing and population factors may explain pronounced differences in changing young adult homeownership entry. The analyses particularly emphasise links between housing unaffordability and competition as determinants of worsening homeownership opportunities for young adults.

Health Effects of Housing Insecurity and Unaffordability in the General Population in Barcelona, Spain

While the negative effects of housing insecurity and unaffordability on health are well known, most of the studies in Spain have focused on very specific social groups so their findings cannot be extrapolated to the general population. The aim of this study is to assess the effects of housing stress and risk of displacement due to economic reasons, and their combined effect, on the mental and physical health of the general population from a middle-income neighborhood of Barcelona. We conducted a cross-sectional study using a household health survey which included respondents from a representative sample of 1202 non-institutionalized residents (> 18 years old) of the Horta neighborhood. We carried out a descriptive analysis, estimated the prevalence of poor mental and self-rated health (stratifying by the independent variables) and fitted robust Poisson regression models to estimate the effects of housing stress (HS) and the risk of forced displacement (RD) on self-rated health and mental health (GHQ-12). All analyses were stratified by sex. We found a higher likelihood of poor general and mental health among people affected by HS and/or RD compared to those not affected by HS and/or RD. A graded effect of HS and RD emerged mainly on mental health, even after adjusting by socioeconomic variables and housing tenure. The serious problem of housing insecurity and unaffordability in Spain is a widespread public health issue. Evidence-based public policies to improve well-being and health of people under this threat are urgently needed.

Understanding the Spatial Effects of Unaffordable Housing Using the Commuting Patterns of Workers in the New Zealand Integrated Data Infrastructure

Commuting behaviour has been intensively examined by geographers, urban planners, and transportation researchers, but little is known about how commuting behaviour is spatially linked with the job and housing markets in urban cities. New Zealand has been recognised as one of the countries having the most unaffordable housing over the past decade. A group of middle-class professionals called ‘key workers’, also known during the pandemic as ‘essential workers’, provide essential services for the community, but cannot afford to live near their workplaces due to a lack of affordable housing. As a result, these key workers incur significant sub-optimal commuting. Such job-housing imbalance has contributed to a so-called spatial mismatch problem. This study aims to visualise the excess commuting patterns of individual workers using the Integrated Data Infrastructure (IDI) from Statistics New Zealand. The visualisation suggests that over the last demi-decade, housing unaffordability has partially distorted the commuting patterns of key workers in Auckland. More of the working population, in particular those key workers, are displaced to the outer rings of the city. While there is an overall reduction in excess commuting across three groups of workers, key workers remain the working population with a disproportionate long excess commute.

Determinants of Public Housing Affordability for Large Income Diversity Groups in a New-Town Capital City: A Case Study of Abuja, Nigeria

Scholars are polarized on the issue of the best approach for measuring housing affordability. This has generated a lack of consensus on the best method to adopt in measuring the concept. Consequently, this study is set-out to extend the literature on housing affordability by examining the public housing affordability for each income group in Nigeria using Abuja as a case study city. This study is aimed at providing the contextual framework for the redefinition of housing affordability based on the diversity of income. The housing cost approach was used to measure housing affordability, whereas the principal component analysis determined factors that caused the unaffordable housing market. The results showed that public housing was not affordable to low and medium-income earners. The unaffordable housing market for each of the three income groups was influenced by diverse factors. Consequently, public housing provision should consider the affordability of each income group. This is because factors that determine housing affordability are peculiar to each of the three income groups.

‘Trapped’, ‘anxious’ and ‘traumatised’: COVID-19 intensified the impact of housing inequality on Australians’ mental health

Increased time spent at home during COVID-19 exposed inequities in Australian housing quality and availability. Many Australians lack sufficient space to carry out activities shifted to their homes and the financial downturn rapidly increased stress around housing affordability. Research demonstrates living in unaffordable or poor-quality housing can negatively impact residents’ mental health. This study explores the mechanisms through which housing moderates COVID-19’s impact on mental health by analysing 2,065 Australians surveyed in mid-to-late 2020. Hierarchical linear regressions were used to examine associations between housing circumstances, neighbourhood belonging and mental-health outcomes (loneliness, depression, and anxiety), adjusted for demographics. Open-ended responses were analysed using thematic analysis and critical-realist epistemology. Feeling ‘trapped’ and ‘helpless’ because of insecure tenure or lack of money to improve housing conditions reduced participants’ sense of control. Inadequate space and noise adversely impacted participants’ well-being. Participants’ housing context – including amenities, natural spaces, and social connections – strongly impacted their emotional experiences. Safe, secure, and suitable housing is a known determinant of safety and physical health; this study suggests it is also a critical factor for Australians’ mental health. To improve mental health among the vulnerably-housed, future housing policy should not compromise on housing affordability, quality, space and access to nearby amenities.

Decomposing Housing Unaffordability

A US household is considered ‘rent burdened’ when its rent exceeds 30% of its income. This simple ratio can be decomposed to better understand the sources of unaffordability across space. To demonstrate this new approach, I rewrite the equation for rent burden as a sum of four factors: rent gap, income gap, excess size cost, and demographic baseline, and show that US rental unaffordability is mostly the result of low incomes. Focusing on the New England region, however, I show that high rent is the primary cause of unaffordability in high-cost, high-wage metro areas. This decomposition can help affordability advocates prioritise strategies appropriately across space.

Transaction Cost Economics Identification in Malaysian Housing Development: A Preliminary Review

Shelter, albeit being one of the crucial physiological needs in Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, is still considered as luxury needs as many people still struggle to afford a house especially in Malaysia. The issue stemmed from the mismatch between the affordability level and the housing prices. Many research delved from the demand and supply perspective to find the root cause, however, the problem still prevails. Hence, this research aimed to study the aforementioned issue from the transaction cost economics (TCE)’s perspective. TCE provides a platform to allow parties to deduce the invisible costs from transaction of activities. This can be done by determining the effectiveness of each transaction profile by enhancing the value between the two transactions, hence, lower the costs. This paper outlined a preliminary finding on TCE’s identification in typical housing development process based on RIBA Plan of Work 2013 process protocol. RIBA Plan of Work 2013 was chosen to provide a standard platform of measurement to ensure consistency in activities listed in the pre-contract and post-contract in typical housing development process. Interviews were conducted with purposive sampling with individuals working directly with housing development. The respondents were asked to verify the list of pre-determined TCEs by indicating whether those activities constitute under the TCEs components and whether activities identified as redundant or inefficient can be removed or enhanced. Analysis conducted using the frequency analysis managed to determine the most important and also the most redundant transaction cost components in a typical housing development. The findings revealed an interesting fact where the number of transaction cost components at both pre and post-contract were higher than the anticipated number attained from literature review. Higher number of identified transaction cost components indicates higher transaction cost in housing development. This further suggested that certain activities which were found redundant or inefficient can be either removed or enhanced to lower the transaction costs. The research findings provide a useful platform to further verify the TCE in housing development. The components will be quantified to ultimately develop a framework for a best practice transaction cost economics model to apprehend unaffordable housing issues. Hence, it is noteworthy that combining TCE and Lean Management theory will enhance this on-going research on identification and quantification of the transaction costs within the housing development to address matters that cause high transaction costs that subsequently increases the housing prices.

LOCATION HOUSING AFFORDABILITY INDEX: ANALYSING THE RELATIONSHIPS

Previous studies claimed that Malaysia is inclined towards a severely unaffordable housing price. Despite such crucial studies, the topics do not provide sufficient empirical evidence to establish a relationship between housing prices, housing and transportation expenditure in Malaysia. Therefore, this study examines the role of these variables in determining the Location Housing Affordability Index. The research had therefore identified measurement items that contribute to Location Housing Affordability Index. The primary data was obtained from urban areas in the Klang Valley using questionnaires, where a total of 363 respondents were selected using the Simple Random Sampling technique. The Partial Least Squares (PLS) method was adopted in analysing the collected data to determine the relationship. The outcome demonstrated the relationship between housing price, housing and transportation expenditure, indicating the significance of the Location Housing Affordability Index and can be a reference for housing policymakers.

Housing, Living Arrangements and Mental Health of Young Adults in Independent Living.

Young adults are prone to psychological stress and anxiety induced by major transitions to adulthood. While employment has predominated in previous research on the social determinants of young people’s mental health, this study examines the association between young people’s housing problems and mental health in the context of an unaffordable housing market. Using the Survey on the Living Conditions and Welfare Needs of Youths (n = 1308) in Korea, the study found that perceived poor housing quality and material hardship are negatively associated with the mental health of young adults living independently. Specifically, while poor housing quality and material hardship induced by housing cost burden were negatively associated with single-person households’ mental health, only poor housing quality was associated with non-single-person households’ mental health. This study is one of the few studies examining the linkage between housing problems and mental health of young adults and informs the interventions aimed at promoting the psychological well-being of young adults in the transition from parents’ homes to independent living.

Housing prices and the probability of marriage among the young: evidence from land reform in China

PurposeUsing data from the China Health and Nutrition Survey, this work examines the relationship between housing price and the probability of marriage among the young.Design/methodology/approachBy exploiting land reform as an exogenous change in housing price and employing a differences-in-differences framework, this study investigates the effects of housing price on the marriage probability of young people.FindingsThis work confirms that land reform decreased young people's likelihood of marriage. This finding is robust to a series of model specifications. The effects of land reform increased over time because of rising housing unaffordability from progressively inflating housing prices. Moreover, land reform had larger effects on renters and young adults aged below 30 than homeowners and young adults aged above 30.Social implicationsOverall, this study highlights the negative consequences of an overheated housing market on marriage in developing countries.Originality/valueHousing prices have increased dramatically in urban China after 2002 upon the implementation of the assignment system of the use right of all kinds of profit-oriented lands by means of public bidding, auction and quotation. High housing prices indicate serious housing unaffordability, especially for young people who typically have low income and wealth. Homeownership that comes with various benefits can theoretically increase the likelihood of marriage, particularly in China where a house is often regarded as a prerequisite for marriage.

A Regional Analysis of the Relationship Between Housing Affordability and Business Growth

Using U.S. Census data for the period 2010 to 2016, for 383 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) and 3,137 counties nationwide, the authors examine the relationship between housing affordability and business growth in three industrial sectors: Retail, Information, and Professional Services. Housing affordability is measured by the percentage of cost-burdened homeowners and renters, defined as the proportion of households paying 30% or more of gross income toward owners’ costs or rents. The results of a generalized method of moments dynamic panel regression analysis are mixed using MSA-level data. However, using county-level data, the authors find compelling evidence that an increase in homeowner and renter cost burden has a statistically significant adverse effect on business growth in all three business sectors. For instance, over a 7-year period, if housing unaffordability increases by 1 percentage point annually, the number of Professional Services establishments is expected to shrink by 90,248 across 3,137 counties nationwide.

Smashed avocado: a property market advice manual for millennial women

ABSTRACT This article contributes to literature on housing affordability and the ways in which neoliberalism has inflected debates related to the issue through a textual analysis of the property market advice manual, Smashed Avocado: How I Cracked the Property Market and You Can Too by Australian author, [Haddow, Nicole. 2019. Smashed Avocado: How I Bought Into the Property Market and You Can Too. Carlton: Nero]. The text is significant in demonstrating the mediation of neoliberal constraints via self-help/how-to property guides which orient millennials’ inwards, presenting a reading of ‘the self’ as problem and solution, while leaving market orthodoxies undisturbed. In highlighting discourses of individualism, self-responsibility, internalised governmentality, and the classed subjectivities offered in the text, this paper extends existing knowledge by mapping the convergence of neoliberal sensibilities with housing-related self-help literature targeting millennial women. While Smashed Avocado elides classed inequalities between women, and operates within the logics of capitalism, it nonetheless an important site of analysis for thinking through mediated geographies of millennial’s evolving relationship to housing unaffordability in the Australian market.

Exploring legacies of the baby boomers in the twenty-first century

As the baby boomers neared retirement at the turn of the twentieth century, attention focused on what the future might look like for both them and succeeding generations. Public discourse about boomers often depicts them as a selfish and narcissistic generation that have benefitted from the largesse of the modern welfare state yet seem intent on denying those benefits to their children and grandchildren. Millennials have similarly been condemned as a ‘snowflake’ generation unwilling to accept the responsibilities of full-blown adulthood, though, unlike the boomers, they have experienced the negative effects of late capitalism, such as job insecurity, student debt and housing unaffordability. Sometimes disparities between boomers and millennials have been seen as producing a ‘generations war’. However, using generation as shorthand for what are often more complex issues suffers ‘generationalism’ insofar as it belies intragenerational heterogeneity, among other things. Drawing on sociological conceptions of generation, it is an aim of this article, and the contributions contained in this Special Issue, to explore the veracity of claims made around generations, ‘generations at war’ and the legacies of baby boomers.