The residential mobility of migrants and their descendants in France : an approach based on individual data

The aim of this paper is to study the determinants of the residential mobility of immigrants and the descendants of immigrants in France. We draw on data from the French Survey named Trajectories and Origins Survey (Trajectoires et origines or TeO) of 2008 (INED-INSEE), which makes it possible to distinguish immigrants, second generation immigrants, and France's so-called majority population, defined as persons having no immigrant origin over two generations. We estimate the causal impact of individual characteristics or characteristics of the territory of initial residence on the mobility indicators of changes in housing and access to homeownership. Our results show that immigrants, and more specifically those from Sub Saharan Africa and North African countries, are more geographically mobile but have less chance of acceding to homeownership than the majority population. Only the descendants of mixed (exogamous) couples behave like the majority population in terms of access to homeownership.