Discrimination in the Housing Market: A Literature Review

Housing is one of the three basic needs of man alongside food and clothing. Housing is globally recognized as a fundamental human right. Housing has a positive impact on man’s welfare, health, efficiency, social behavior, satisfaction, and employment opportunities etc. Man’s access to housing can be frustrated by discrimination, and this discrimination occurs on various grounds. This study reviewed extant literatures on housing discrimination with the aim of revealing key findings, and gaps in literatures so as to set up future research agenda. The study made use of literatures extracted from Google scholar. . This study found that the housing discrimination occurs along the line of gender, race, ethnicity, religion, language, age, marital status, disabilities, income level, occupation, immigration status, family size, sexual orientation, nationality, color of skin, gender identity, victims of domestic violence, and ex-offenders. Most studies on housing discrimination has been carried out in United States, Germany, and Canada. This study found that there is paucity of study on housing discrimination in Nigeria, and there is need to fill this gap in literature.