A Three-Stage Model of Housing Search,
Abstract
Despite its importance in the residential mobility process, housing search as a determinant of moving behavior has been given scant attention in literature on the subject. Although limitations of data have contributed to this oversight, in large part it reflects the narrowness of particular disciplinary approaches, which typically focus on moving per se and thus simplify what is in fact a complex and multifaceted mobility process. As a result, even those studies which acknowledge the importance of the search process have failed to focus on it in a satisfactory way. Such studies divide into two types: formal models of the decision to move (Speare et al., 1975; Hanushek and Quigley, 1978) that recognize housing search as a transaction cost but rarely examine search behavior; and descriptive studies of search activity (Barresi, 1968; Hampel, 1969a and 1969b; Barrett, 1973) that lack a satisfactory theoretical structure for assessing how search affects mobility. Consequently, too little is understood about how households' moving decisions are shaped by the perceived benefits and costs of moving, how households' uncertainty about those benefits and costs influences their decisions to undertake an active search, or how various search costs affect moving behavior.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 01, 1980
- Accession Number
- ADA095091
Entities
People
- Kevin Mccarthy
Organizations
- RAND Corporation