House of the rising son (or daughter): the impact of parental wealth on their children’s homeownership

Homeownership rates have plummeted for today’s younger generation. Hypothetically, it would currently take a 27-30 year old first time buyer around 18 years to save for a deposit if they relied solely on savings from their own disposable income (up from three years two decades ago). Rising unaffordability has led many first-time buyers (FTBs) to rely on family or friends to help with the deposit on their first home. The rise of the so-called Bank of Mum and Dad (BOMAD) is much-discussed but until now there has been little analysis of the strength of the relationship between parental support and people’s chances of becoming homeowners.

This paper fills this gap. Using a novel dataset which connects parents and children we are able not only to analyse the association between the property wealth held by people’s parents and their own, but we are also able to strip out the impact that other factors (earnings, education, etc) have on homeownership.