“Welcome to the housing market. We’re glad you’re finally here.” That’s how Jonathan Smoke, chief economist of Realtor.com, wraps up his letter to today’s growing number of millennials who plan to become homeowners in the near future. In his letter, Smoke offers advice for millennials as they embark on their home-buying journey.
Dear Millennial Future Home Buyer:
This is shaping up as your year! Congratulations. You and your older siblings are jumping into the housing market en masse. And it’s happening for all sorts of reasons, including the fact that you’re getting older and wiser.
Approximately 43 million of you are 25 to 34 now. (Hey, where did the time go?) That’s the age when Americans typically buy their first homes, and we expect nothing less of you. You and your cohorts outnumbered all other age groups of home buyers last year – even though not as many of you were buying as usual in a healthy economy.
So it is no surprise to us that in June you officially became the age group most likely to purchase a home this year.
Over 60% of you are looking at real estate online each month. More and more of you are waking up to the fact that rents are rising now faster than home prices. Because homeowning builds wealth over time, when home prices, rents, and mortgage rates are all going up – like they are now and will be for the next several years – there is a substantial opportunity cost to waiting to buy.
