Public Rental Housing and Young Adults’ Transitions to Marriage and Parenthood: The Need for Life-Course-Oriented Housing Policy
Institute for Future Strategy Issue Brief, Vol. 64
“Public Rental Housing and Young Adults’ Transitions to Marriage and Parenthood: The Need for Life-Course-Oriented Housing Policy”
This issue brief empirically examines how living in public rental housing affects the timing of marriage and the birth of a first child among young adults, and proposes policy directions.
As housing support expands in response to record-low fertility and declining marriage rates, it is important to determine whether living in public rental housing actually leads to marriage and childbirth. Using data from the Seoul Housing Survey, this brief analyzes the effects of public rental housing separately along two pathways: the transition to marriage and the transition to childbirth after marriage.
The analysis finds that living in public rental housing accelerates young adults’ transition to marriage. However, it finds no clear effect on the timing of a first birth among newly married couples without children. Households living in small public rental units, in fact, had a significantly lower likelihood of proceeding to childbirth. These findings suggest that housing stability can lower barriers to marriage, but that adequate living space is also needed to support childbirth and child-rearing.
The brief therefore calls for “life-cycle-linked public rental housing policy” that provides continuous support for young adults as they move through marriage and parenthood. It recommends expanding the supply of public rental housing for unmarried young adults and introducing measures to temporarily preserve eligibility upon marriage, so that combining household incomes does not immediately disqualify couples. It also emphasizes the need to establish pathways for moving to larger units upon marriage or childbirth, expand the supply of medium-sized housing, and diversify unit sizes within the same or nearby housing complexes to make such moves possible. Together, these measures would strengthen housing support in line with changes in household life stages.
