Does Owning a Home Make Us More Generous?

We examine the multifaceted influence of homeownership on charitable giving through several channels: tax deductibility, household wealth, and mobility. We find that homeowners donate substantially more than renters, and tax deductibility, wealth, and mobility are important predictors of the owner-renter gap in donations. We also show that the owner-renter difference in donations cannot be fully explained by these three channels. After controlling for an extensive list of household characteristics and the three channels, homeowners still donate approximately 20% more than renters. Our results are robust to a variety of modeling and identification strategies as well as different measures of donations. Our study further reveals that the likelihood of donating correlates inversely with mobility but is insensitive to tax deductibility and wealth. In contrast, tax deductibility and wealth are important predictors of the size of contributions. Furthermore, we show the owner-renter difference in donations varies substantially by generational cohorts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]