THE EVOLUTION OF HOUSING CONSUMPTION DURING THE EMPTY NEST PHASE

Abstract

Ageing population has been a topic of interest in Singapore because of the wide-ranging ramifications across various disciplines, such as sociology, politics and economics. As housing is considered to be the single largest asset that an average household possess in their lifetime, it is important to examine the mechanics behind adjustments in housing consumption. Despite the wealth of related literature exploring housing consumption of households, this topic has received limited academic attention in Singapore. Hence, this research paper contributes to the existing literature by exploring the evolution of housing consumption in the context of Singapore, which has a different socio-cultural context.

Descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression were employed to study the relationship between variables identified through literature review and housing consumption. In the regression model, it was revealed that changes in housing satisfaction, financial capability, market conditions and housing policies, investment and housing demographics were statistically significant in influencing the likelihood of no adjustments in housing consumption. All of these variables displayed inverse relationship with the dependent variable, thus suggesting that respondents who cited the above factors were more likely to reduce housing consumption. The key hypothesis postulated that older households do not reduce their housing consumption during the empty phase due to deep emotional attachment to the house. This was found to be unsupported by the regression model. Hence, an in-depth research is recommended to gain deeper appreciation of housing consumption patterns which would pave the way for the formulation of effective housing policies to tackle ageing issues.