Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Despite the importance of housing and location characteristics to the wellbeing of older households, we know surprisingly little about their residential choices and the primary factors that drive their decisions to move. The majority of older households are homeowners, and many of these households have a substantial share of their wealth invested in their home. Older households are also often out of the labor force, and therefore have lower incomes and may be more likely tap into their housing wealth. Even without lower incomes, older adults are entering a period of life changes, which may make them more likely to move as they enter retirement, experience health problems, or simply prefer to reduce their housing consumption. Understanding the likely behavior of older adults over the coming decades has important implications for local housing markets. Whether older adults will be more likely to downsize and relocate to urban areas, remain in their long-time homes, or relocate to be near children all have important implications for housing supply and demand during the coming years of population aging.

Our goal in this paper is to further the understanding of residential housing and location choices as we age, and to highlight the key factors that drive moving and housing decisions for older adults. We focus specifically on how the mobility choices of adult children also influence the moves of their parents. Ultimately, these findings will inform potential policies that could increase the likelihood of households living in aging-appropriate homes and communities.

We explore the following facets of older adult mobility:

1. Mobility patterns: Who moves? How do age, retirement, and other life events affect moving decisions?
   
   
2. Distance from children: To what extent are people moving closer to their adult children?
   
   
3. Age-friendly moves: What are the post-move housing and neighborhood characteristics? How do these compare with their pre-move characteristics, and those of households who stay? Is post-move housing more aging appropriate?

To answer these questions, we use data from the geocoded version of the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), a large, biennial, nationally-representative panel survey of older adults that began in 1992. In addition to detailed information on individuals and their homes from the survey, we use the geocodes to match on a variety of neighborhood and location attributes. We are also able to use the geocoded information on respondents’ children coupled with questions about child co-residence, grandchildren, and proximity to children to explore how the location of children influences mobility.

With our rich dataset, we explore the role of individual, family, housing, and neighborhood characteristics in residential mobility and location choice. We explore the role of proximity to children and caregiving in moving decisions. Finally, for those who move to another home, we compare the old and the new home and neighborhood along a variety of dimensions.