The Filtering of Households and Housing Units

Abstract

The concept of filtering is about one hundred years old, yet much remains to be done to solidify a common understanding of the process and its policy implications-not the least of which is to clearly distinguish filtering's processesfrom its results, and to clarify whether the focus is on households or housing units. This article presents a model of filtering gleaned from the literature and discusses its assorted criticisms. Next, the literature is cast in its one hundred-year historical context to show how it evolved and how it was influenced by housing policy considerations of different eras. The article then offers a unifying framework for filtering's exposition. This framework allows the basic dimensions of filtering to be presented within its shelter system, and also shows how they are connected to larger economic and demographic forces in society that drive the filtering processes in the first place. The framework also allows a substantive rather than merely chronological organization of the literature. Finally, areas for future research are suggested based on this framework.

Cohort Succession in the US Housing Market: New Houses, the Baby Boom, and Income Stratification

“…Filtering theory, a key ecological perspective, explains that households are stratified by income in the age of housing they occupy: Higher income households are more likely to live in high quality newer houses, and as the housing ages, it ''filters down'' in price and condition and is bought by lower income households (Grigsby 1963;Baer and Williamson 1988). US housing policy has long been characterized by a de facto filtering strategy, encouraging the continual construction of new houses in order to improve the housing stock for all as everyone moves up the quality ladder (Baxandall and Ewen 2000).…”

Conceptualising Social Housing within the Wider Housing Market: A Vacancy Chain Model

“…Galster (1997) specifically doubts the effectiveness of such subsidies in benefiting the lowest income households. Despite Baer and Williamson's (1988) warning to keep the filtering process and result conceptually separate, it is probably the case that the ability of the filtering concept (despite the challenge of empirical evidence) to support blanket policies that promote supply side intervention at the higher end of the market (and thus downplay the importance of social housing provision) has led to its fall from analytic fashion -and, with it, the allied technique of vacancy chain modelling.…”

Old apartments and new plans: reconciling planning and housing goals in two Texas cities

“…Scholars argue about the fluidity of this process and its ability to ensure a stable supply of affordable rental housing in decent condition (Baer & Williamson, 1988;Galster, 1996). Ideally, for this process to work most efficiently, rental housing should be constructed at a steady rate, so that stock is being added (and lost) at a similar rate.…”