Staying in the city or moving to the suburbs? Unravelling the moving behaviour of young families in the four big cities in the Netherlands

Abstract

In many postindustrial cities in the Global North, increasing families seem to choose to stay in the city rather than move to the suburbs. This might imply that residential preferences of young families shift from suburban to more urban. In this paper, the moving behaviour of young families in the four largest cities in the Netherlands is analysed. The moving behaviour is measured with register data and analysed with the Oaxaca‐Blinder decomposition technique and with logistic regression techniques. The results show that young families broken down by residential biography and income have very different moving behaviours in their choice for staying in the city or moving to the region around the city. The changes in the outmigration of young families from the city to the region are not necessarily related to changing residential preferences, but more related to changes in the composition within the group of young families. The growth of higher‐income families in cities seem to be primarily explained by the changing composition of city dwellers before family formation and not so much by a more urban orientation in their moving behaviour. Changes in moving patterns through time and the differences between the four cities seem to be related to the differences in the urban economy and housing supply. Especially in Amsterdam, the lack of larger family home drives young families to the suburbs. When cities and suburban regions want to be attractive for young families, the size of the available dwellings is the most important aspect.

Spillover of urban gentrification and changing suburban poverty in the Amsterdam metropolis

“…The share (and number) of these households that had their former address in Amsterdam is smaller but increased significantly between the two time periods (from 11.2% to 14.4%). This is likely related to the growth of the city in general (Booi et al, 2021). The share of movers from Amsterdam in the total number of moving households is not evenly spread over the neighbourhood types.…”

“…They also affect larger, owner-occupied single-family dwellings more than smaller rental apartments. This indicates a preference, for both high- and low-income households, for living near the urban core but also for more ‘suburban’ dwelling types, which are scarce in the city (Booi et al, 2021; Kadi and Musterd, 2015).…”

“…Not all of them stay and some will eventually move to the suburbs. With the increasing growth of core cities in the 21st century, suburbanisation from these core cities might even become more relevant (Booi et al, 2021).…”

“…In gentrified cities, where not as many areas are left that are ‘gentrifiable’, suburban areas around the city may be the next alternative (Paccoud and Mace, 2018). Gentrified cities increasingly see an out-migration of high-income and higher-educated households into the metropolitan regions around cities (Booi et al, 2021; Mazanti, 2007; Sandow and Lundholm, 2020). House prices have increased, especially in cities (Hochstenbach and Arundel, 2020), and, for some households, the difference in house prices between cities and (parts of) suburban areas serves as a trigger to sell their house in the city and buy a larger one in a less expensive area elsewhere in the metropolitan area around the core city (Karsten, 2020).…”

“…In the beginning of the 21st century this dynamic has again become prominent, albeit changed in character. Contrary to the suburbanisation period of the 1970s and 1980s, when the core city was in decline (Hayden, 2003), the growth of the outflow of the city currently coincides with the continuing growth of the core city (Booi et al, 2021;Sandow and Lundholm, 2020). The increasingly expensive core city is not able to accommodate all the urban population growth, triggering increasing migration of high income households into the region around the urban core (Booi et al, 2021;Mazanti, 2007;Paccoud and Mace, 2018).…”