chapter 7 Discussion & conclusion
Throughout this study the central goal has been to answer the question: “How do young adults with different educational backgrounds adopt specific strategies to pursue their desired housing pathways in the overheated Amsterdam housing market?”. Over the course of two chapters it has been shown how the housing pathways of PE and CE young adults differ, how these differences are related to preferences towards housing as a result of their life-course trajectories and habitus, and how the resulting choice sets create significantly different strategies in dealing with the overheated housing market. The final results will initially be summarized concisely, after which it will be shown how they add to existing knowledge and fit within current debates in the field of residential mobility.
7.1 Conclusion research questions
1. By combining insights from both qualitative and quantitative analyses, a definitive answer to the first research question: “What factors account for differences in the housing pathways of practically educated and college educated young adults within the changing context of the overheated housing market?”, can be formulated.
It has been shown that PE young adults postpone nest leaving to an increasing extent, are increasingly likely to cohabit with a partner straight out of the nest, generally live in more peripheral neighborhoods and are relatively more, and to an increasing extent, dependent on public housing than their CE counterparts. The postponement of nest leaving and growing dependence on public housing are partly explained by inaccessibility of the private rented sector, because of high prices and exclusion by tenants and/or landlords, and growing waiting times in the public housing sector. Besides these structural explanations however, individual factors with regards to lifecourse trajectories and habitus play an important role as well. As PE young adults start working, engage in
cohabitation, and family formation earlier their choice set is more limited than that of their CE counterparts.
They often cannot risk being evicted, have to obtain housing that facilitates both cohabitation and a workminded lifestyle, and therefore have a harder time finding housing that suits their needs. In contrast, CE young adults often prioritize early nest leaving in order to gain independence and facilitate the transition towards higher education. While studying, they seem more apt to deal with potential evictions or ending contracts, therefore allowing them to make more diverse, risky and uncertain moving decisions allowing them to leave the nest earlier.
2. The complicated mechanisms between pathways, the life course and habitus described above can subsequently be more concisely formulated by answering the second research question: “To what extent do life course trajectories and the habitus of practical and college educated young adults explain the difference in housing preferences and choice sets”.
It has been shown that finishing education, starting a professional career and engaging in a steady relationship are associated with a transition towards a more tranquil lifestyle, in which regularity and stability become more important. While the same transition occurs amongst both PE and CE young adults, the significant difference in its timing (about four years earlier amongst PE) creates significantly different preferences and attitudes towards housing at a similar age. It translates into a preference for relatively spacious housing in quiet, family friendly residential neighbourhoods in suburban areas at an early age amongst PE young adults. Conversely, an elongated period of studying and living without a partner amongst their CE counterparts create preferences for more centrally located, dynamic neighbourhoods with sufficient leisure- and cultural amenities. In addition, it provides them with more freedom to share housing with peers and make concessions with regards to apartment size in order to find suitable housing, therefore expanding their choice sets compared to those of their PE counterparts.
However, the fact that their preferences remain significantly different even when their life-courses line up, shows that differences in habitus as a result of socialization throughout childhood and thereafter play an important role as well. PE young adults seem to inherit an outlook on life by their parents in which a stable family situation and financial surety are key to further development, which is consequently amplified by peers within their social network. Conversely, amongst CE young adults this focus seems centred more around independence, personal development and extending the social network before eventually settling down. This is consequently amplified by socialization through peers into a student habitus that is focussed on dynamism and cultural exploration, which seem to persist regardless of their position in the life course.
3. How the specific choice set of young adults, as a result of the interplay between changing structural conditions, life course trajectories and the habitus, influences strategies to deal with the overheated market will be shown by answering the final research question: “What explains the difference in the kind of active strategies practically and college educated young adults employ in order to realise their desired housing pathways?”.
On a structural level, long waiting times in the public housing sector force young adults to either look for housing in the expensive private rented-or alternative housing sector. However, affordable entry to private rented housing seems much more difficult to attain for the PE because of exclusion from shared housing as a result of the
selection culture, and from individual apartments because of stricts (income) requirements put up by landlords that generally favor CE individuals.
On the individual level, difference in life course trajectories and habitus provide CE young adults with a relatively extensive choice set compared to their PE counterparts, which allows them to make more concessions with regards to floor space, temporality/informality, and employ elongated sharing with peers as an active strategy to counteract high prices (in central areas). The differences in choice set are further amplified by the fact that CE young adults accumulate social- and cultural capital through the student habitus, which are increasingly crucial to obtain desired housing within the overheated housing market. (Not) Sharing the student habitus therefore seems to add to unequal opportunities with regards to attaining affordable housing, especially in the private sector. Finally, the distribution of intergenerational support, which smoothen housing transitions
amongst CE young adults, further adds to unequal opportunities between CE and PE young adults.
Together these elements can explain the difference in the active strategies they employ to follow specific housing pathways. The limited choice set of PE young adults significantly restricts the amount- and diversity of strategies they can employ to find suitable, affordable housing outside of the official (public-housing) sector.
Therefore, their pathways seem to be much more vulnerable to its increased waiting times and therefore stresses the added value young people contracts bring to the table by increasing throughput in the sector.
Because of these constraints, facilitated by a more family oriented habitus, PE young adults increasingly seem to opt for postponed nest leaving as an active strategy in order to accumulate capital to accommodate future housing moves. Moreover, couples looking to have children either postpone family formation, or move out of the expensive Amsterdam area completely in search of owner-occupied housing.
In contrast, the more extensive choice set of CE young adults enables them to engage in relatively risky informal and/or temporary housing forms after leaving the nest in order to gain independence. Through the years however they gradually obtain social and cultural capital through the student habitus, which they can later apply
to access higher quality, stable housing. The extent to which they have access to these capital forms and their ability to deploy them strategically seems increasingly crucial in creating desired outcomes, especially considering their increasing dependence on the private rented sector in which they have to compete with many others. Finally, their independent lifestyle and embodied student housing experiences seems to make them opt for elongated shared housing with peers as an active strategy to deal with high prices (in centrally located areas).
By strategically combining their diverse capital while making some concessions towards their ideal housing pathways, they generally seem able to remain housed in Amsterdam, at least for now.
Author: Tobias Dobbe
Supervisor: Pieter Hooimeijer
Utrecht University
Department of Human Geography
In cooperation with AFWC & de Key