UNDERSTANDING THE DRIVERS FOR, AND POLICY RESPONSES TO, THE RAPID GROWTH OF PRIVATE RENTING IN ENGLAND: HAS ‘GENERATION RENT’ BEEN ‘PRICED OUT’? BY BENJAMIN PATTISON A thesis submitted to the University of Birmingham for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY School of Social Policy College of Social Sciences University of Birmingham January 2016 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. Abstract This thesis investigates the factors which account for the rapid growth of private renting in England and how these factors have interacted to produce the growth. It challenges the most common explanation which is that potential owner occupiers were ‘priced out’ and have instead become private renters. A mixed methods approach addressed three key limitations of popular and academic explanations of this trend using an analytical framework developed from critical realism. Multivariate analysis of socio-economic changes between 2001 and 2011 assessed the interaction between drivers and their relative influence. Geo- demographic analysis identified different niches within the private rented sector in Birmingham and highlighted the diversity of the tenure. Wider political drivers were investigated using Political Discourse Analysis. These political drivers shaped supply and demand for private renting at a national and local level. Research findings demonstrate that the growth of the tenure is due to the interaction of a wide range of drivers acting from the global to the individual. Drivers acting at a variety of levels results in differential growth across niches and geographic areas. My results confirm the importance of the growth of private renting, particularly in relation to the polarisation of wealth and accommodation for low-income households. Dedication For Liz, Amie and Daniel In memory of Iain Pattison and Douglas Black Acknowledgements With thanks to Karen Rowlingson and David Mullins for their support and advice. The support of Rashid Ikram and Birmingham City Council in accessing data is gratefully acknowledged. A number of helpful suggestions and comments were received during presentations of early findings at various conferences. Table of Contents Chapter One - The rapid growth of private renting: Definitions, history and international comparison .................................................................................... 1 1.1 The rapid growth of the private rented sector in England ...................... 1 1.2 Defining the private rented sector ............................................................. 7 1.3 The origins of ‘generation rent’ and the ‘priced out’ thesis ...................... 12 1.3.1 ‘Generation rent’ in the media .......................................................... 12 1.3.2 ‘Generation rent’ as a social problem ............................................... 15 1.4 The decline of private renting prior to the 1980s ..................................... 20 1.4.1 Private renting before 1945 .............................................................. 20 1.4.2 From 1945 to the 1979: Beveridge to Thatcher ................................ 24 1.5 Tenure change in other national housing systems .................................. 28 1.6 Overall research question and thesis structure ....................................... 35 1.7 Summary of chapter one ..................................................................... 37 Chapter Two - Issues with ‘generation rent’ and existing explanations ............ 39 2.1 The ‘priced out’ thesis and growth of private renting ............................... 39 2.2 Broader issues with ‘generation rent’ and ‘priced out’ thesis .................. 46 2.2.1 Other potential drivers .................................................................. 47 2.2.2 The role of landlords ......................................................................... 51 2.2.3 Diversity within the private rented sector .......................................... 59 2.2.4 Supply and demand across all tenures ............................................ 62 2.2.5 The ‘ideology of home-ownership’ .................................................... 66 2.3 Wider importance of growth of private renting ..................................... 70 2.3.1 Polarisation of wealth ....................................................................... 70 2.3.2 Provision of accommodation for low income households ................. 75 2.4 Summary of existing literature and detailed questions ............................ 78 i 2.5 Summary of chapter two ..................................................................... 83 Chapter Three – How tenure change occurs: Theoretical approaches ............ 85 3.1 Theoretical descriptions of tenure change .............................................. 85 3.1.1 Social Struggle ................................................................................. 86 3.1.2 Systems and complexity ................................................................... 89 3.1.3 Historic institutionalism ..................................................................... 91 3.2 Housing as a field: a unifying theory of tenure change? ......................... 96 3.2.1 Bourdieu and house building in France ............................................ 97 3.2.2 Strategic action fields and mortgage markets ................................ 102 3.3 Revisiting historic approaches to tenure change .................................. 108 3.4 Summary of chapter three .................................................................... 112 Chapter Four - Investigating tenure change: Analytical framework and methodology ................................................................................................... 114 4.1 Analytical framework ............................................................................. 114 4.1.1 Levels at which different drivers operate ........................................ 114 4.1.2 Research questions and methodology for subsequent chapters .... 120 4.2 Ontological and epistemological approach: critical realism ................... 122 4.3 Research design ................................................................................... 126 4.3.1 Research design: overall approach ................................................ 126 4.4 Methods: Triangulation using a mixed methods approach .................... 129 4.4.1 Multi-methods approach ................................................................. 129 4.4.2 Secondary analysis of data ............................................................ 134 4.4.3 Ethics of secondary analysis of data .............................................. 136 4.5 Sequence and methodologies .............................................................. 138 4.6 Summary of chapter four ...................................................................... 143 ii Chapter Five - Priced Out? Multivariate analysis of economic and demographic drivers of demand ........................................................................................... 144 5.1 Investigating the interaction between drivers ........................................ 144 5.2 Geographic variation in tenure change ................................................. 148 5.3 Tenure change and house prices ......................................................... 156 5.4 Possible demographic drivers ............................................................... 160 5.5 Multivariate analysis of demographic and economic drivers ................. 169 5.6 Discussion of findings from regression models ..................................... 178 5.7 Summary of chapter five ....................................................................... 186 Chapter Six - Diversity within private renting: niche analysis in Birmingham .. 189 6.1 Diversity within the private rented sector ........................................... 189 6.2 Methodology for niche analysis ............................................................. 194 6.3 Tenure change in Birmingham .............................................................. 201 6.4 Geodemographic analysis .................................................................... 208 6.4.1 Geodemographic analysis of the private rented sector in 2011 ...... 208 6.4.2 Geodemographic analysis of changes in private renting between 2001 and 2011 ........................................................................................ 210 6.5 Stock ..................................................................................................... 214 6.6 Housing Benefit analysis ....................................................................... 220 6.6.1 Housing Benefit claimants within Birmingham ................................ 220 6.6.2 Spatial distribution of Housing Benefit claimants ............................ 223 6.7 Birmingham niche typology ................................................................... 227 6.7.1 Identification of variables and the