This study will establish the parameters for an investigative focus towards discerning the socioeconomic variables underlying the housing conditions Canadians lone parent families face everyday within Winnipeg. In particular, a quantitative investigation into the lives of lone parents families reveals a number of interesting socioeconomic variables which have been insufficiently addressed in past governmental and pedagogic research. The research is conducted through 1981 to 1991 utilising data from the Winnipeg Area Study surveys of families in the urban area of Winnipeg. This study has delineated a method of analysis which underscores the relative importance variables pertaining to the understanding of the housing needs have for the lone parent family housing needs. In particular, the variables of housing affordability including education, occupation, income, age and gender form a substantive basis for an empirical measure of housing needs for the lone parent family through the analysis of covariance method. As well, empirical measures of housing needs for lone parent families within Winnipeg are introduced to facilitate the measurement. The analysis includes a means to evaluate housing suitability through an indexed measure based on empirical data. Included within the analyses are twenty tables and computer code generated for the Winnipeg Area Study.