Housing Crisis and Family Well-Being: Examining the Effect of Foreclosure on Families

Laryssa Mykyta, U.S. Census Bureau

The housing market crash in the mid-2000s was characterized by unusually high rates of mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures. Thus, many families faced the prospect of losing their homes. Although several recent studies have examined the effects of the foreclosure process on families, most have focused on specific metropolitan areas or used aggregate foreclosure data. Using a unique data set linking the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2008 Panel of the Survey of Income and Program Participation to individual foreclosure event data collected from local government sources by RealtyTrac, I estimate random and fixed effects regression models to examine how experiencing foreclosure affects family well-being and changes in well-being, including economic well-being, hardship, access to social support, food security and neighborhood conditions. As SIPP is a panel survey, I am able to follow families through the foreclosure process and examine their outcomes before, during and after foreclosure.