Separating Renters and Homeowners in Low Income Household Measurements

Hi Alex,

Are you working with the PUMS files? If so, you can merge the population file with the housing units file using the serial number (actual variable is called "serialno") and then there's a variable for tenure called "ten" in the PUMS housing units file that has four values for occupied housing units:

b .N/A (GQ/vacant)
1 .Owned with mortgage or loan (include home equity loans)
2 .Owned free and clear
3 .Rented
4 .Occupied without payment of rent

The income will come from the households you have in the population file.

You can find this in the Data Dictionary, and other technical documentation about PUMS here: census.gov/.../documentation.html. The PUMS "ReadME" file has sample SAS code to merge the two files on page 4.

Hope this helps!
-Diana

Hi Alex,

Are you working with the PUMS files? If so, you can merge the population file with the housing units file using the serial number (actual variable is called "serialno") and then there's a variable for tenure called "ten" in the PUMS housing units file that has four values for occupied housing units:

b .N/A (GQ/vacant)
1 .Owned with mortgage or loan (include home equity loans)
2 .Owned free and clear
3 .Rented
4 .Occupied without payment of rent

The income will come from the households you have in the population file.

You can find this in the Data Dictionary, and other technical documentation about PUMS here: census.gov/.../documentation.html. The PUMS "ReadME" file has sample SAS code to merge the two files on page 4.

Hope this helps!
-Diana

I've mostly been using ACS data, but I'll look into this, thanks!