Housing Experiences and Outcomes of an Understudied Urban Population

In this project, the PIs use interviews and interviewer assisted surveys to expand our knowledge related to the housing of renters, homeowners, and unhoused people from an understudied urban population. Several research questions are investigated including how members of this population experience renting, homeownership, and houselessness and how such experiences shape their socioeconomic and health outcomes. Broader impacts of the research include the direct applicability of findings to housing decisions concerning this population, and the educational and training opportunities the project provides to graduate and undergraduate students. This project builds on an existing partnership to conduct a mixed-methods study of the housing experiences and socioeconomic and health outcomes of an understudied urban population. Methods used include a survey of 1,000 urban residents and longitudinal qualitative interviews of a subsample of 80 survey respondents. Four general research questions are examined. These concern how the housing experiences of this population vary, how members of this population interact with neighbors and landlords, the methods they use to deal with housing issues, and how their housing experiences affect their health and socioeconomic outcomes. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.