Cohort Insights into the Influence of Education, Race and Family Structure on Homeownership Trends by Age: 1985 to 1995

This paper attempts to further clarify the findings of Joseph Gyourko and Peter Linneman in “The Changing Influences of Education, Income, Family Structure, and Race on Homeownership by Age over Time” that appeared in the Journal of Housing Research. We have confirmed the findings of Gyourko and Linneman that those with less than high school education are seriously disadvantaged with respect to homeownership attainment over their life-course. This is true for both blacks and whites, and for all household types. Furthermore, it appears that successively younger cohorts of the least educated are falling even further behind in homeownership progress when compared to high school graduates in the same cohort. There is some evidence that successively younger cohorts of high school graduates are also slipping in the progress they are making in attaining homeownership as they age. However, this slippage for high school graduates is either greatly reduced or eliminated when different household types are examined, suggesting that it has been the shift away from higher ownership married couple households that has been causing the slowdown in ownership progress for all household types combined. This shift has been especially pronounced for black households. A college degree makes a huge difference in homeownership attainment for blacks, eventually resulting in homeownership levels that are 20 percent higher than that of black high school graduates…