The Impact of Housing Conditions on Health Outcomes

We investigate the relationship between housing conditions and health using a dataset that tracks 25,000 German households over 25 years. Approximately half of these are tenants, for whom home renovation is exogenous. We document that individuals exposed to poor housing conditions report worse mental and physical health, and experience an 11 percent increase in doctor visits, increasing to 20 percent for age groups over 64. These effects control for individual, dwelling and temporal fixed effects, and are robust to changes in socio-economic status, lifestyle choices, and neighbourhood conditions. Our findings complement the literature on outdoor environmental conditions and health outcomes.