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America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2009

Housing Problems

Inadequate, crowded, or costly housing can pose serious problems to children's physical, psychological, and material well-being.76 Housing cost burdens, especially at high levels, are a risk factor for negative child outcomes, including homelessness, overcrowding, poor nutrition, frequent moving, and lack of supervision while parents are at work.77 The percentage of households with children that report that they are living in physically inadequate,78 crowded, or costly housing provides an estimate of the percentage of children whose well-being may be affected by their family's housing.

Indicator PHY4: Percentage of households with children ages 0–17 that reported housing problems by type of problem, selected years 1978–2007
Percentage of households with children ages 0–17 that reported housing problems by type of problem, selected years 1978–2007

NOTE: Data are available for 1978, 1983, 1989, and biennially since 1993. All data are weighted using the decennial Census that preceded the date of their collection.

SOURCE: U.S. Census Bureau and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, American Housing Survey. Tabulated by U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

  • In 2007, 43 percent of U.S. households (both owners and renters) with children had one or more of three housing problems: physically inadequate housing, crowded housing, or cost burden resulting from housing that costs more than 30 percent of household income.79 In comparison, 40 percent of households with children had a housing problem in 2005. This percentage has increased over the long term from 30 percent in 1978.
  • Physically inadequate housing, defined as housing with severe or moderate physical problems, continues to decrease. In 2007, 5 percent of households with children had physically inadequate housing, compared with 9 percent in 1978.
  • Crowded housing, in which there is more than one person per room, remained stable at 6 percent of households with children in 2007, following reductions in crowded housing observed through 1993.
  • Improvements in housing conditions, however, have been accompanied by rising housing costs. Between 1978 and 2007, the incidence of cost burdens among households with children more than doubled, from 15 percent to 37 percent. The proportion with severe cost burdens, paying more than half of their income for housing, rose from 6 percent to 16 percent over the same period.
  • Households that receive no rental assistance and have severe cost burdens or physical problems are defined as having severe housing problems.80 The percentage of households with children facing severe housing problems increased from 14 percent in 2005 to 15 percent in 2007.
  • Severe housing problems are especially prevalent among very-low-income renters.81 The incidence of severe problems among very-low-income renters with children changed from 36 percent to 35 percent between 2005 and 2007.

table icon PHY4 HTML Table

76 Papers addressing specific housing-related health issues are available at http://www.hud.gov/offices/lead/researchers.cfm.

77 Bridge, C., Flatau, P., Whelan, S., Wood, G., and Yates, J. (2003). Housing assistance and non-shelter outcomes. Sydney, AU: Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute.

78 Physically inadequate units are defined as those with moderate or severe physical problems. Common types of problems include lack of complete plumbing for exclusive use, unvented room heaters as the primary heating equipment, and multiple upkeep problems such as water leakage, open cracks or holes, broken plaster, or signs of rats. See definition in Appendix A of the American Housing Survey summary volume, American Housing Survey for the United States: 2007, Current Housing Reports, Series H150, U.S. Census Bureau, 2008.

79 Paying 30 percent or more of income for housing may leave insufficient resources for other basic needs. See National Academy of Sciences. (1995). Measuring poverty: A new approach. Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

80 The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development considers renter households to have "priority" housing problems if they have eligible incomes for, but do not receive, rental assistance, and they report either severe housing cost burdens or severe physical problems with their housing units. Because of questionnaire changes, data after 1997 on assisted families, priority problems, and severe physical problems are not comparable to earlier data.

81 The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development defines "very-low-income renters" as renter households with incomes at or below half the median family income, adjusted for family size, within their geographic area.