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Abstract
This article conceptualizes the relationship between housing instability, residential mobility, and neighborhood quality. We summarize the existing literature about residential mobility and housing instability and examine their potential interactions along three dimensions: (a) the reasons for a move, including a variety of push and pull factors; (b) mobility outcomes in terms of whether moves result in residing in a better or worse neighborhood than that of the prior residence; and, especially important for low-income households, (c) the degree to which the current move and past experiences of moving have been discretionary or forced. Housing instability is a cumulative concept, with involuntary moves at its center. This synthetic model of housing instability's impact on mobility outcomes suggests that the more instability a household has experienced, the less likely mobility moves are to occur, or, if they do occur, to be long lasting. Policy implementation may underestimate the interaction between cumulative housing instability and residential mobility in housing mobility policies. Thus, these interactions have implications for mobility policies, pointing toward a path for future research that inform policies to move low-income households toward both greater housing stability and better neighborhood outcomes.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Rachel Garshick Kleit
Rachel Garshick Kleit is a professor and section head of city and regional planning in the Knowlton School of Architecture at The Ohio State University. Her research interests include the role of housing in poverty alleviation, the social network impacts of mixed-income housing, and public housing authorities as developers of affordable housing. She holds a PhD in city and regional planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a master's degree in urban and environmental policy from Tufts University.
Seungbeom Kang
Seungbeom Kang is a PhD student in the city and regional planning program at The Ohio State University. Residential mobility of low-income households is one of his main research interests. He has a master's degree from Yonsei University in Korea.
Corianne Payton Scally
Corianne Payton Scally is founder and Chief Executive Officer of HOUSERS LLC. Prior to founding HOUSERS, LLC, she was an associate professor of urban planning in the Department of Geography and Planning at the University at Albany, SUNY. Her interests include housing and community development policies and practice with the aim of improving communities. She holds a PhD in urban planning and public policy from Rutgers University and a master's degree in urban and regional planning from Florida State University.