Housing Mobility and Downsizing at Older Ages in Britain and the United States

James Banks, Richard Blundell, Zoe Oldfield, James P. Smith

Published Sep 22, 2010

This paper examines geographic mobility and housing downsizing at older ages in Britain and America. Americans downsize housing much more than the British largely because Americans are much more mobile. The principal reasons for greater mobility among older Americans are two fold: (1) greater spatial distribution of geographic distribution of amenities (such as warm weather) and housing costs and (2) greater institutional rigidities in subsidized British rental housing providing stronger incentives for British renters not to move. This relatively flat British housing consumption with age may have significant implications for the form and amount of consumption smoothing at older ages.

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RAND Style Manual
Banks, James, Richard Blundell, Zoe Oldfield, and James P. Smith, Housing Mobility and Downsizing at Older Ages in Britain and the United States, RAND Corporation, WR-787, 2010. As of September 25, 2024: https://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/WR787.html
Chicago Manual of Style
Banks, James, Richard Blundell, Zoe Oldfield, and James P. Smith, Housing Mobility and Downsizing at Older Ages in Britain and the United States. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2010. https://www.rand.org/pubs/working_papers/WR787.html.
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