Family Dynamics and First-time Homeownership

1. Contact: a.w.m.smits@uva.nl Annika Smits & Clara H. Mulder, University of Amsterdam Family Dynamics and First-time Homeownership Motivation Research question Results The transition to first-time homeownership is related to such household events as cohabitation and marriage (Rossi, Clark et al) as well as to parents’ homeownership (Henretta). We expect to find that, for the Netherlands, these relationships have changed during the last few decades. More people have come to value homeownership as an investment rather than a risk. Furthermore, differences between married and unmarried couples regarding the likelihood of becoming homeowners are expected to have decreased due to the changing meaning of cohabitation and marriage. Have the effects of household events and parental homeownership on the transition to first-time homeownership changed during the last decades? We find that singles, cohabiters, and those who are just starting cohabitation have become more likely to become first-time homeowners than have married people without children. The data did not provide evidence for changes in the importance of the intergenerational transmission of homeownership. Data The Netherlands Kinship Panel Study has been used. We constructed a person-year file of 111,201 years from 5079 respondents. Transition to first-time homeownership, odds ratios % becoming homeowner for each household status category, per year % becoming homeowner for each parents’ tenure category, per year Method Discrete-time hazard analyses of the transition to first-time homeownership were performed using logistic regression analysis of person-years.