The signs that Australia is again heading into a period of rising interest rates raises old questions about the impact on families wanting to buy their own home. If interest rates and house prices increase in the way they did in the 1980s, and incomes remain steady or fall in real terms, would we expect to see a sharp fall in rates of home ownership. Despite such conditions in the past, the proportion of families who are owner-occupiers remains remarkably high. Part of the explanation for continuing high rates of home ownership is that families, and the housing market, are not static and passive, they adjust and interact to meet changing economic and social opportunities and problems. This article describes three of the adjustment processes by which families pursue their ownership ambitions and confound forecasters of falling rates of home ownership. Here, the three factors are called substitution, postponement and market adjustment. (Introduction edited)