Owners.com, a tech enabled brokerage, just released a survey of +1,000 consumers of all ages who had recently purchased a home. The intention of the survey was to learn how consumers addressed four key elements…
- home buying process,
- budget management
- home search
- suggestions on improving the process
First things first. 83% of these consumers across the country worked with a real estate agent and 82% confirmed the importance of on-line access to data-focused property information.
Home Buying
The majority of all national homebuyers (55%) indicate that they do research online to make decisions and to initiate their next steps with their real estate agents.
Within that percentage, 78% of Gen-Xers believe that data and machine learning will be extremely important to the real estate experience over the next 10 years. Gen-Xers see themselves as being more “hands-on” in the real estate process and are most likely to do their own research without relying on their agent to do the research. In fact, only 29% of Gen-Xers trust their agent to do “the legwork” of home buying and only 9% rely on their agent to tell them what to see/view and/or what to consider.
Millennials (33%) and Boomers (36%) do trust their agent to do the legwork of home buying. 19% of Millennials actually rely on their agent to tell them what to see/view and what to consider whereas only 9% Boomers want to be told and shown.
Interestingly, more Boomers (59%) do their own online research than Millennials (48%).
Budget Management
It turns out that 1/3 of all national buyers went over budget when buying their home by an average of $16,500.
40% of Millennials went over budget by $24,545; 34% of Gen-Xers by $13,996; and only 19% of Boomers went over budget by “just” $8,024.
Home Search
When asked the most reliable resource in the home searching process, 50% of Gen-Xers chose online data and platforms, 41% of Boomers chose online data and platforms and 38% Millennials followed suit. Nationally, 42% of all consumers rely on data and platforms.
54% of Boomers said they rely most on agents to help in the home search process. 47% Millennials chose agents as their primary resource and 42% Gen-Xers chose agents. Nationally 48% of all buyers rely most upon real estate agent to help during the home search process.
One interesting statistic, but also a common sense one since most first-time buyers tend to be Millennials, 13% Millennials rely heavily on their family and friends as resources to help them during the home buying process. 7% of Gen-xers and 4% Boomers rely on their family and friends as resources.
Daniel Maloney, Head of National Sales at Owners.com, said, “Doing your own research on line is a good starting point, but an expert real estate agent that is plugged into the local market can offer inside knowledge and help streamline the process to help buyers get into their dream homes even faster.”
Consumer Suggestions to Streamline Process
- 66% would value getting access to additional listings
- 61% would like data on home appreciation, walk scores and neighborhood information all in one place
- 60% value agent’s understanding of their preferences
- 23% felt the most important benefit in having an agent is having someone to help negotiate a better offer than what they could get on their own
- 47% felt agent could have provided bundled services to help save them money.
