Examining the Relationships between Young Adults’ Housing Tenure, Elements of Perceived Job Security and Social Capital in Britain

ABSTRACT: This paper investigates the relationships between young adults’ housing tenure, social capital, and elements of perceived job security in Britain. Young adults are faced with different situations that continue to shape their housing consumptions and decisions. Socio-psychological dimension of housing tenure decisions has been receiving attention by housing market analysts and practitioners seeking deeper understandings of UK housing market dynamics, particularly in the wake of changing tastes and preferences of young people with regards to housing decisions across major cities of the world. More specifically, very little research has been done to investigate the contributions of social capital formation, for example, neighbourhood or social integration and social relations, separated by perceived job security, on housing tenure transitions among British young adults. The initial steps taken include a synthesis of existing literature and confirmation of data availability for the study. This will ensure existing efforts are not duplicated, opening up and further revealing how the current study may contribute to existing knowledge. A quantitative approach has been designed to analyse the data obtained from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). The hypothesis drawn is that individual young adult’s tenure mobility may vary by combinations of the direction of transition, social capital, and perceived job security. It is our view that findings from this study will significantly enhance our understanding of tenure shifts amongst young adults in the UK and provide property developers, local authorities, and central governments the knowledge and information to guide urban renewal towards achieving better social cohesion and sustainable communities.