Two-home family situations of children and adults in France and Australia: observation and consequences for describing family patterns

With the increasing diversity of family situations, more people – children as well as adults – now ‘usually’ live in more than one dwelling. The aim of this paper is, first, to estimate the proportion of people living in two dwellings, and second, to describe the consequences of these two-home situations on basic estimates of family situations based on ‘routine’ surveys or censuses. We base our paper on two large-scale surveys the 2004 EU-SILC in France and 2001 HILDA in Australia. Children commuting between two parental homes are very likely to be counted twice in usual surveys and censuses. This is less likely for adults. In France, 2004, 6% of children and adults registered in the survey are living in two dwellings. When the likely double-counting of children is controlled for, some 3.5% of children aged under 18 live in two dwellings, 2.2% share their time between both parents’ homes, and 1.3% live partly with their parents and partly away from home or at boarding school. When these situations are taken into account, the proportion of children not living with both parents falls from a biased estimate of 22.3% to 18.9%. Among French adults, the actual prevalence of multi-residence must be between 4% and 6%, with a peak at ages 20-24. In Australia, multi-residence is much less frequent: 1.4% in the sample – between 1.0% and 1.4% if double-counting is controlled for. Living in two dwellings is linked to specific family situations, often temporary or ambiguous. Taking multi-residence into account is a challenge, but it is crucial not only to avoid doublecounting, but also to accurately describe family situations of adults and children.