Keys to the Future: How Gender and Sexuality Shape Parental Financial Support for Home Ownership

• In Event: 50261 - Family Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 11: LGBTQ+ Families

Abstract

Intergenerational ambivalence, or the presence of both negative and positive feelings and actions between parents and children, is a key dimension of sexual minority family dynamics in adulthood. However, there has been very little attention to the instrumental forms of intergenerational support, such as financial transfers, from parents to their adult sexual minority children and how these forms of support differ by children’s sexuality and gender. This paper addresses parental financial support in the form of home buying assistance to examine whether parents help their straight and sexual minority adult children differently and whether these patterns reflect differences in children’s need for home buying assistance. We find that parents provide more home buying assistance to straight sons compared to sexual minority children and straight daughters. By examining how gender and sexuality shapes intergenerational support through parental home buying assistance, this study provides further insights into how families reproduce existing socioeconomic advantages and disadvantages across generations.

Authors

• Yiwen Wang, Rice University

• Katherine Alexander, Rice University

• Caroline Lan Gainer Wolski, Rice University

• Rachel Tolbert Kimbro, Rice University

• Bridget K. Gorman, Rice University