Introduction

Hulton Archive/Getty Images

If you’re like many Americans, you have just spent a few days in close quarters with your parents, grandchildren, siblings, etc. You’re ready to go home, or ready for them to go home. But for a growing number of families in which adult children can’t afford to live on their own, this is the new normal.

These “boomerang” children have been the butt of jokes on late-night television and even in commercials, but what’s so bad about moving back in with your parents? Could extended families under one roof — a common arrangement in years past — be the way of the future?