Date of Award

Summer 2026

Language

Englsih

Embargo Period

8-11-2026

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

College/School/Department

Department of Sociology

Program

Sociology

First Advisor

Samantha Friedman

Committee Members

Samantha Friedman; Zawadi Rucks-Ahidiana; Zoya Gubernskaya

Keywords

subsidizied housing, voucher, renters, mobility procees, residential attainment

Subject Categories

Inequality and Stratification

Abstract

The aim of this dissertation is to identify differences in the mobility process and residential attainment across different types of renters with different incomes and by housing subsidy status. More specifically, I compare subsidized renters to unsubsidized, low-income renters as well as unsubsidized, moderate-income renters. The guiding question of this dissertation is, “what processes around mobility help or hinder subsidized households in attaining residential outcomes?” The motivations for addressing this question and the related gaps in the literature are discussed in Chapter 1.

Using data from the American Housing Survey (AHS), I address this question over three analytical chapters in which I compare subsidized renters to two types of unsubsidized renters: low-income households that qualify for but do not receive HUD (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) rental assistance (USQ renters); and households whose incomes disqualify them from receiving assistance (NQ renters). The first two analytical chapters examine elements of the mobility process and the last one the residential attainment of two vulnerable populations: older adults and people with disabilities. The first analytical chapter (Chapter 2) explores housing mobility and unit turnover patterns across one type of subsidized renter, Housing Choice Voucher (voucher) households, and two types of unsubsidized renters (USQ and NQ).  The hypotheses are informed by the predatory inclusion framework, which suggests that landlords actively recruit marginalized groups for the purpose of selling products that are more costly or of lower quality. The results show that 1) voucher households are the least likely to move; 2) when they move, voucher households are more likely to move into a unit vacated by another voucher household than not, which supports hypotheses under the predatory inclusion framework; 3) units with voucher out- or in-movers are more likely to be in neighborhoods with serious crime, abandoned or vandalized buildings, and a presence of trash or junk on the street which also supports predatory inclusion hypotheses; but counter to these hypotheses, 4) landlords are more likely to make change to units which may attract new tenants to units that turnover between USQ and NQ renters than voucher households. Overall, I find mixed support for the predatory inclusion framework.

In the second analytical chapter (Chapter 3), I examine another element of the mobility process: why households move and how they search for new housing. I use the same three types of renters examined in Chapter 2. The hypotheses are informed by the residential satisfaction and life-events perspectives as well as the social structural sorting perspective. Though the mobility process is similar across the types of renters examined in this chapter, there remain key differences in the reasons these groups move and how they search for housing. For example, I find that voucher and NQ households’ reasons for moving align the most with the residential satisfaction perspective while USQ households’ reasons for moving align more with the life-events perspective. When it comes to searching for housing, USQ households’ methods align with the social structural sorting perspective the most out of the three types of renters. Not only do the results show that the mobility process is different by both income and subsidy status, but also that divergent explanations are needed to understand the mobility process across these types of renters.

The last analytical chapter (Chapter 4) compares residential attainment across four renter groups. Two of these groups are subsidized households (place-based and voucher) and two are unsubsidized households (USQ and NQ). Additionally, I limit the samples in this chapter to two growing and vulnerable populations: older adults and people with disabilities. These two groups are overrepresented among subsidized renters. However, little research examines the intersection between these vulnerable groups by income and subsidized housing status as they are associated with residential outcomes. This makes it challenging to plan equitable housing for the increasingly older and more disabled population that is anticipated in the coming decades. I find that among households with an older adult or at least one person with a disability, place-based, subsidized units are more likely to be of lower quality and located in more disordered neighborhoods than units with USQ renters. While voucher households are accessing similar units to USQ renters, the former are also located in more disordered neighborhoods. These findings highlight the need for subsidized housing programs and policies to not only consider unit quality, but also neighborhood disorder and accessibility for these vulnerable populations.

Collectively, the results across the three analytical chapters show that unit and neighborhood features are stratified by income and subsidy status. Moreover, subsidized renters in particular often face the worst outcomes, especially with regards to neighborhood characteristics. There are mechanisms, like predatory inclusion, discrimination, and even the search tools households use, perpetuating these differences. By looking at different elements of both the mobility process and residential attainment outcomes, this dissertation illustrates the connection between the structural segmentation of the rental market and different aspects of the mobility process.

License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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