Housing Conditions and Housing Determinants of New Migrants in Chinese Cities

Abstract

With a database based on 3,168 questionnaires collected from six Chinese cities: Guangzhou, Dongguan, Shenyang, Chengdu, Hangzhou, and Zhengzhou, this study examines housing conditions and determinants of new migrants in urban China. Quantitative analysis reveals that three types of Chinese new migrants—labor migrants, intellectual migrants, and entrepreneurial migrants—have different housing conditions. Marked disparities in housing facility quality among the six cities have also been identified. The housing conditions of new migrants are mainly determined by socioeconomic factors and by institutional factors such as hukou status. In addition, housing facility quality is primarily affected by hukou status, income, educational levels, marriage, age, and migrant type, but hukou is the major determinant.