Does home ownership vary by sexual orientation?

The housing literature considers whether the probability of owning a home is different for ethnic and racial minorities than for native whites. Most studies find that minorities are less likely to own a home than their white counterparts. A logical extension of this line of research is to consider whether home-ownership rates differ based on sexual orientation. We use data on couples from the 2000 Census and find that same-sex couples are less likely to own a home than are married couples. The average value of houses owned by same-sex male couples is statistically similar to the average value of houses owned by married couples, but houses owned by same-sex female and cohabiting couples have lower average values than those owned by married couples. Conditional on owning, same-sex couples are slightly less likely to have a mortgage compared to married couples.