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Abstract Starting from the premise that 'culture' has generally been overlooked in the analysis of immigrant housing in Canada, this study examines the housing experiences of Ghanaian and Somali immigrants [...]

A study was conducted to examine the degree to which the movement into Housing Market Renewal Pathfinder areas in England is beneficial or problematic given the increased demands on local services. Findings indicate that migrants have a positive effect because they increase demand for private rented and owner-occupied housing.

Across the United Kingdom, new build and remodelled 'extra care' schemes are being developed in many areas on the assumption that they offer older people with care needs an alternative to residential care. This paper reports an evaluation by a multi-disciplinary team of 10 extra-care schemes remodelled from sheltered housing or residential care units. The evaluation audited buildings and identified social and architectural problems. No two schemes in the sample were alike; some aimed for a dependency balance and others set a dependency threshold for admission. The three criteria used for assessing eligibility were the number of paid care hours the older person had at home, their property status and the type of disability. This article focuses on the wide variation in assessing eligibility for an extra-care place and on some social consequences of remodelling. A number of tenants remained in situ during the remodelling process in six of the schemes. Building professionals were unanimous that retaining some tenants on site caused significant development delays and increased the remodelling costs. There was also a social price to pay. 'Old' tenants resented their scheme changing into extra care and were hostile towards ' new' tenants who had obvious needs for support. In some extra-care schemes, 'old' tenants were refusing to participate in meals and all social activities. KEY WORDS--extra-care housing, remodelling sheltered housing, tenant hostility to newcomers.

The impact of demographic changes in the housing markets in Scotland and England are studied. Population decline and aging put downward pressure on housing prices in the two markets.

During the later 20th century, France experienced a dramatic turn around in the quality of its housing. The current cohort of older people witnessed and lived through the transformation. Most people aged over 50 years in France are homeowners and almost one-in-four own a second home. Although the oldest age groups are much less residentially mobile than younger people, home moves are more likely around the age of retirement or widowhood. In recent years, new forms of residential mobility in later life have been emerging. These include a weakening of the commonly observed pattern of a permanent drift away from cities and towns towards areas of childhood origin or family connections. One current trend suggests a preference for preserving residential links with areas of relatively high population density and good access to amenities, coupled with being able to spend time elsewhere, whether in second homes, in children's and grandchildren's homes, or elsewhere. The arrival of the post-1945 baby-boom cohort at retirement has begun, and this may increase the current level of residential mobility and lead to more diverse types, although the change will depend on the development of the housing market as well as residential preferences in old age. KEY WORDS--France, Paris, housing conditions, longevity, residential mobility, residential strategies, second homes, baby-boom cohort.

This commentary argues that one-size-fits-all aging in place solutions will often not be in the best interests of low-income and frail older homeowners in the United States. This contrarian view runs counter to the reported preferences of this group, various private-sector activities, and U.S. public policies that are increasingly funding home and community-based care. The particular focus is on low-income elderly homeowners living in the oldest housing stock in the country who have demographic characteristics putting them at greater risk of having both unmet care and housing needs, which in turn have spillover effects on their neighborhoods. These vulnerable homeowners would be better served if they relocated to more affordable, easier to maintain, and better designed smaller owned units or rental properties or to planned affordable seniors' rental housing complexes that can offer both light and heavy care. Such residential moves are often not feasible, however, because of the shortage of these housing arrangements. KEYWORDS. Aging in place, affordable housing, long-term care, older homeowners

This qualitative study delineates motives for residential mobility, describes dynamics between the elder and family members during the move decision process, and locates the move decision within ecological layers of the aging context. Interviews were conducted with 30 individuals and couples (ages 60-87) who experienced a community-based move within the past year, and with 14 extended family members. Reasons for moving (from perspectives of both elders who moved and their family members) were grouped into four themes and eleven issues that influenced the move decision. These themes parallel the ecological context of individual health and functioning, beliefs and attitudes, physical environment, and social pressures. Late-life mobility is a significant life transition that is the outcome of an ongoing appraisal and reappraisal of housing fit with individual functioning, needs, and aspirations. Family members are an integral part of these decision and residential mobility processes.

The Great Migration was a period between 1910 and 1940 of rapid population shift when hundreds of thousands of southern African Americans resettled in the North hoping to find better [...]

Measuring housing quality or value or both has been a weak component of demographic and development research in less developed countries that lack an active real estate (housing) market. We describe a new method based on a standardized subjective rating process. It is designed to be used in settings that do not have an active, monetized housing market. The method is applied in an ongoing longitudinal study in north-east Thailand and could be straightforwardly used in many other settings. We develop a conceptual model of the process whereby households come to reside in high-quality or low-quality housing units. We use this theoretical model in conjunction with longitudinal data to show that the new method of measuring housing quality behaves as theoretically expected, thus providing evidence of face validity. Keywords: housing quality; standardized subjective rating; building elements; household wealth; Thailand; longitudinal studies

Studies show that in most parts of US metropolitan areas there is residential discrimination on the basis of race and color. A research is conducted to examine the intergenerational persistence of Black-White residential segregation outcomes for a sample of US households.

Objectives. We conducted an ecologic analysis to determine whether housing characteristics mediate the associations between concentration of poverty and pediatric injury and between concentration of racial minorities and pediatric injury and whether the association between housing conditions and pediatric injury is independent of other risks. Methods. We created a hierarchical data set by linking individual-level data for pediatric injury with census data. Effect sizes were estimated with a Poisson model. Results. After adjustment for owner occupancy and the percentage of housing built before 1950, the association between concentration of poverty and pediatric injury was attenuated. For concentration of racial minorities, only percentage of owner occupancy had some mediating effect. In hierarchical models, housing characteristics remained independent and significant predictors of pediatric injury. Conclusions. The association between community characteristics and pediatric injury is partially mediated by housing conditions. Risk of pediatric injury associated with housing conditions is independent of other risks. (Am J Public Health. 2004;94:633-639)

In Papua New Guinea. the men's cult houses are dramatic examples of vernacular architecture that have overshadowed the importance and symbolic meanings of tim domestic dwelling, or women's houses. This essay is an ethnography of house forms, specifically women's houses and men's cult houses in Bariai, West New Britain. The focus is on relationships of articulation between the built environment and gender concepts within the framework of Bariai cosmology, which show how gender concepts and relations are emplaced and the built environment is gendered.

This article examines Griqua women's association with houses in historic, economic, and ritual contexts during the twentieth century. Using archival data, I argue that the connection between women and houses in South Africa stems from a complex interaction between their pre-colonial Khoi origins, Christian missionary activity, and apartheid government housing policy. Ethnographic research demonstrates how, during the second half of the twentieth century, women ritually stressed their association with houses, but were unable to sustain this dominance in everyday life. An examination of ritual, gender, and housing, in relation to material objects and space, provides insights into how a series of rituals performed in Griquatown facilitates both the expression of an unambiguous Griqua identity and daily multi-ethnic interactions. The house is like a family, and in its history the family appears as solid as a built structure. As we go through the house, memories not only describe physical space but also tell a social history. Domestic space serves as a metaphor for the human entity that inhabits it. (Bahloul 1996: 10), This article examines the life course of people growing up in Griquatown, South Africa, and explores the manner in which people used ritual in the creation and maintenance of both [...]

The research in this paper focuses on the housing career during a household's life-course. The housing career is the sequence of housing states defined in terms of tenure and the quality/price of the dwellings that households occupy while they make parallel careers in family status and the job market. The research brings out, more than the literature on separate residential moves, that many households are in a stable housing state over long stretches of their life-course. Housing careers are notable for having a relatively simple structure and, in general, an upward trend in quality, price and tenure of the sequence of dwellings occupied. As expected, there is a close relationship between the type of housing career and a household's income and income growth. Regional variation in tenure composition and the price of the stock have a strong influence on the development of the housing careers in different regions.

The article examines the Glasgow, Scotland housing market to develop alternative identification and definition schemes for developing a consistent analytical approach to describing submarkets. Findings indicate that submarkets for housing are determined by structural and spatial factors.

This article evaluates housing tenure choice in the metropolitan Los Angeles area among racial and ethnic minorities from 1980-1990. Results show that differences in income, education and immgrant status explain the homeownership gap between whites and Latinos; however, Asians are as likely to own homes as whites are, and this is not effected by immigrant status; the homerownership gap among whites and blacks is also sizable.

A comparison of 1980 and 1990 data indicates that the rise in US single-family housing prices during the 1980s increased the tendency for individual households to seek out multifamily housing, as the investment potential between single-family and multifamily housing was no longer equivalent.

An overview is presented on the demographic and economic factors surrounding home selection for young adults in the US. Findings include a link between the housing market's size and location and independent living, the importance of individual resources on selection, and the frequency of sharing among single adults moving to metropolitan areas.

This study applies a life-course approach and retirement migration theory to develop a model of future housing expectations and actual moves for a random sample of men and women in late midlife. Results suggest that late-midlife workers and retirees expect to age in place; expectations to live in highly supportive environments are uniformly low. Older, nonmetropolitan respondents with less education and more years in their homes express the strongest expectations that they will age in place. Those people who rent their homes, have weaker ties to their communities, and have more symptoms of depression tend to foresee a move in the future. However, physical health of respondents and their spouses do not predict future housing expectations. Prior expectations about aging in place, residential history, and life-course changes in marriage and retirement predict actual moves within the next two years, with differing patterns for men and women.

During the 1980s poverty levels among non-Hispanic whites have increased at the same time that the supply of affordable housing has decreased on a national level. The limited amount of affordable housing is theorized to lead to the increased exposure of poor whites to poverty in the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the United States. This research examines the phenomenon of poverty concentration experienced by poor whites in selected US metropolitan areas between 1980 and 1990. A concentration index was used to identify the changes in this phenomenon in addition to a measure of housing affordability specifically calculated for poor non-Hispanic whites. Social and economic variables from the U.S. Census were also used in a series of regression analyses to obtain an understanding of the variables that were associated with increases and decreases in exposure to poverty among poor white Americans.

Using canonical regression analysis, the paper examines the associations between housing conditions, race, poverty and vintage structure age in Cleveland, Ohio's east and west sides. It is found that African-Americans are concentrated in the oldest at-risk housing stocks on Cleveland's east side, but chronic poverty rather than quality deficiency is most associated with their presence. On the west side, the oldest housing stock is experiencing the most deterioration, but a linkage between race and at-risk vintage units is not established; rather, chronic poverty is directly associated with age depreciation. Lastly, in examining the effects of housing conditions, race and mortgage lending, it is found that credit access has little to do with race; rather, housing conditions and the age-depreciation process most affect credit receipt and operate independently of race., In many older, central-city housing markets, ageing housing stocks are moving closer to the end of their age-depreciation life-cycles. Older homes - a mixture of vintages, styles, designs and layouts [...]

Little research has been conducted on housing quality among the elderly. The fault lies partly with the lack of reliable data. Studies on elderly housing quality are spotty, anecdotal, and unsystematic. Many rely on decennial census data which provide a limited and unsatisfactory portrait of special housing needs of elders in general. This article seeks to fill this void by reporting a comprehensive study of elderly housing quality. For all units, logistic regression revealed that region and race are the most important predictors of housing inadequacy; tenure and the gender of the person living alone are moderately powerful influences upon inadequacy. Housing inadequacy is greater among blacks, in the South, for males living alone, and for renters.

How does race influence the housing choices of Hispanic households who have recently moved? Results of this study demonstrate that while Hispanics are more successful than black Hispanics and other-race Hispanics in gaining access to predominantly Anglo subareas, apparently by virtue of their nonblack status. These findings reveal the individual-level processes underlying aggregate patterns of racial segregation among Hispanics and provide evidence of the influence of social and market forces that isolate not only Anglos from African-Americans and Hispanics but also, increasingly, African-Americans and black Hispanics from all persons of nonblack status.

Throughout Western societies, policy-makers who address the problems of disadvantaged ethnic and immigrant minorities confront norms that prescribe equal or preferential treatment for these groups. Variations in these norms make significant differences in policy-making. Based on evidence from housing and planning policies and a standardized survey of local elites in comparable German, French and US metropolitan areas, this article analyses how these norms altered logics of policy-making. Normative differences help to explain why policies to house minorities proved more successful in the German setting than in the French. Contrasts in central-local relations, in local government, in political parties and in the social and economic background of policy-making fail to account for the difference that these norms make. In the American setting normative ambiguities combined with institutional, social and spatial differences to render parallel norms comparatively ineffective. Keywords: United States; Germany; France; housing; immigrants; (ethnic) minorities.

A study based on Census information concludes that, for the age group 15-24, living arrangements of Blacks and Whites such as marriage, independent living, and co-residing with parents have similar trends. For the age group of 25-34, trends for marriage and independent living remain similar. However, Black females in this age group are more likely to live with parents due to a downward marriage trend. Co-residing with parents is more common when the Black matriarchal family system supports such dependency. Economic adversity also plays a major role in influencing living arrangements.

Theory: As the 'structural linchpin' of American race relations, residential segregation has important implications for blacks' and whites' thinking about race. Considered here is the impact of residential context - living in predominantly black or racially heterogeneous neighborhoods in the city or the suburbs - on feelings of racial solidarity among black Americans. Hypotheses: The social density hypothesis predicts stronger racial solidarity among blacks who live in the city and in predominantly black neighborhoods. The social salience hypothesis predicts stronger solidarity among suburbanites and residents of racially mixed neighborhoods. The identity supremacy hypothesis predicts no relationship between residence and sense of racial solidarity. Methods: Regression analysis of survey data for a subsample of black urbanites and suburbanites in the Detroit metropolitan area. Results: The statistical results are most consistent with the social density hypothesis. The conclusion centers on the possible implications of black suburbanization and changing levels of racial solidarity among blacks.

This survey study focuses on stairs in the homes of a substantial number of independently living elderly (60+) residents of a community in which there are mostly multistory houses and apartment buildings with stairs. While the majority could climb their stairs without problems, a substantial minority lived with stairs despite difficulty and even inability in climbing them. Most people were satisfied with their homes, and many were unwilling to admit that stairs were a present or potential problem. Most people, including most with stair problems, had no plans to move from their homes, however a majority was willing to concede under questioning that stair-free living in a presently unplanned next home would be desirable. There is a plea that stairs be of increased concern in the housing of elderly people, and that there be increased planning for stair-free homes.

This article uses data from the 1987 American Housing Survey (AHS) to assess in what U.S. locations elderly (age 60 and over) households are more at risk of occupying physically deficient housing. Metropolitan and nonmetropolitan locations are distinguished by their settlement type (city, suburban, and rural) and regional contexts. The AHS data consisted of a sample of 12,859 age 60 and older householders representing a statistical population of 26,318,348 American households. Within metropolitan areas, central cities had the highest rate of physical deficiencies whereas the urban suburbs suffered from the lowest prevalence rates. Elderly households living in nonmetropolitan rural areas, and in the rural parts of metropolitan areas, had the highest housing deficiency rates in the country. These national comparisons were misleading, however, to the extent that they primarily reflected the poor housing conditions found in only one or two regions of the country, particularly the South.

A study of the expressed preferences of four different ethnic groups in the Los Angeles metropolitan area shows strong desires for own-race combinations in the ethnicity of neighborhoods that individuals say they would choose when seeking a new residence. The results also show that Anglos are not the only group to practice 'avoidance' of other racial/ethnic neighborhoods, although avoidance behavior by Anglos is the strongest. Because the issues of racial composition are socially sensitive, additional tests examined the relationship of preferences to behavior. Although many behaviors generally follow expressed preferences, members of households who expressed 'no preference' also were found to largely choose own race neighborhoods. The results of this study suggest that the expressed preference for own race/own ethnicity, in combination with short-distance local moves, is likely to maintain present patterns of separation in U.S. metropolitan areas.

This study examines the patterns and predictors of housing turnovers among non-Hispanic whites, non-Hispanic blacks, Puerto Ricans, and other Hispanics in New York City during 1978-1987 to assess whether access to housing is distributed differentially by race and ethnicity. The data are taken from the triennial New York City Housing and Vacancy Survey. After controlling for household preferences, purchasing power, and quality characteristics of the housing unit, multinomial logistic regression results show the most consistent and significant predictors of turnover to be geographic and market-sector attributes. The findings suggest the presence of structural constraints in the housing market which effectively channel racial/ethnic groups to separate neighborhoods. The overall results are reminiscent of early studies of neighborhood transition by Duncan and Duncan (1957) and Taeuber and Taeuber (1965), and show that little progress has been made toward achieving equality in housing or informal social contact between racial/ethnic groups.

To better understand the segmentation of the home-buyer market in American metropolitan areas, cluster analysis is applied to the results of three surveys of 6,173 recent home buyers in Hamilton County (Cincinnati), Ohio. Life-style orientation was particularly important in identifying 8 clusters, which highlights the value of using attitudinal as well as objective census-type measures. A large contiguous grouping of cosmopolitan submarkets close to downtown indicates the impact of a growing segment of the population with a taste for urban living. Methods of attracting home buyers to cosmopolita and baseline communities -- those with modestly priced homes suitable for households beginning the family mobility cycle -- are discussed.

This study examines factors affecting the housing consumption of households headed by black women. The investigation focuses particular attention on the extent to which marital status and household composition, especially extended family configurations, influence the quality of housing consumed. The specific measure of housing quality used in the study is crowdedness, proxied by the number of persons per room. Analysis of data taken from the 1980 U.S. Cencus Public Use Sample reveals that female-headed extended households experience crowding disproportionately in comparison to other female-headed households. Marital status, age and location also significantly affect housing consumption. Young black female household heads who are separated and live in the South are particularly likely to reside in crowded conditions. Improved labor market outcomes for household heads are found to be more effective in generating improvements in housing quality than increased transfer payments.

Urbanisation and industrialisation took place in Japan later than in the USA from a different historical and cultural background. Japanese society is more homogeneous and exhibits lesser extremes of socio-economic differences than does society in the USA. Land costs in Sapporo, a city in Hokkaido prefecture, Japan, are distributed regularly from the centre of the city, which provides a basis for ordering population activities, including residences. Dissimilarity indexes computed for 371 'meshes'--each 1 km square--show residential segregation by occupation, marital status and type of housing to be similar in pattern and range to that in the USA.