The Impact of Socio-Demographic Characteristics, Objective Housing Quali-ty and Preference on Residential Satisfaction

Abstract

Residential satisfaction is an important topic in the domain of housing. It refers to the individuals’ appraisal of the conditions of their residential environment, in relation to their needs, expectations and achievements. In the current study respondents were asked to indicate their residential satisfaction on a scale ranging from 1 (very dissatisfied) to 10 (very satisfied). In general, the respondents are quite satisfied (mean satisfaction = 8.2; n = 1557). With the use of regression analyses, the impact of socio-demographic characteristics and objective housing quality on residential satisfaction is explored. A statistically significant impact is observed for tenure, age, number of persons in household, dwelling type, liveliness of neighborhood, size of outdoors space and dwelling ‘value’ (R2 = 18%). The study also explored the impact of preference on satisfaction. Surprisingly, the results showed that respondents who lived in accordance to their preferences were as satisfied as those who did not.