For individuals from the same family background but born six years apart, relative to the slightly older cohort, parental background is increasingly associated with offspring homeownership and housing wealth. over the six-year period 2010/12-2016/18 the association between the intergenerational rank correlation in housing wealth increases by 0.036 rank points. Given a base correlation of 0.18 our estimates imply a doubling in the rank correlation in approximately three decades.
We find that individuals from the most middle east rcs data advantaged parental backgrounds (high educated homeowner parents) are three times more likely to report housing wealth by age 35 and the average level of housing wealth, conditional on holding, is roughly ten times higher (£10,535 versus £ 105,295 measured in 2022 prices) compared to individuals from the most disadvantaged background (low educated renter parents).
Comparing across cohorts, we find those individuals from the most advantaged backgrounds are no less likely to report homeownership and housing wealth compared to older cohorts, whereas the opposite holds true for those from the least advantaged background even after controlling for individual factors including education and earnings, which have been shown to be important in determining wealth accumulation (see Black et al. and Davenport et al.). Our findings highlight the perceived notion that access to homeownership for cohorts born post 1980 is more nuanced than is generally understood.