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Drivers of housing choice among rural-to-urban migrants: evidence from Taiyuan

Policies addressing the influx of rural migrants into Chinese urban areas have evolved over time from active opposition, through suspicious ambivalence, to wary tolerance, and now seem to have entered a new phase in which productive engagement is being attempted. Unfortunately, little information or experience is available to inform policy development in this new era. This paper helps address this knowledge gap by studying housing behaviour and choices among a sample of migrants in Taiyuan. The study's results suggest that migrants' housing outcomes in urban areas are influenced heavily by priorities linked to the transitional economic environment and individual migration characteristics. The analysis finds a more limited role for factors such as income and life cycle, which are central to housing choice in other contexts. We argue that migrants' housing outcomes cannot be explained without reference to the specific set of challenges they face, and the resulting decisions that they make, as a result of their immersion in the country's economic transition.