ABSTRACT
Families provide shelter, a home for themselves, their children, and sometimes aging parents or other relatives. When children first establish a separate household, often as full-time students, many parents cosign a lease to assure a landlord that their child will pay the rent. Whether a family can find a decent home in a nice neighborhood may seem to depend only upon income. But it is more complicated than that. The list of key players shows that obtaining the desired housing for any neighborhood may involve influencing some non-neighborhood players. Although some affluent neighborhoods may be able to maintain themselves without addressing or caring about the development of nearby areas, this eventually will prove detrimental for the community at large and the nation as a whole. The design of neighborhoods and conditions in a community may support or hinder an individual family's ability to perform each of its basic tasks.
