Key Highlights
- Tech-savviness led to nearly 50% of Millennials accelerating home purchases, according to survey from realtor.com
- Share of first-time buyers hit 36% in April 2020, according to National Association of REALTORS® (NAR)
- Median age of first-time buyers was 34, up from 31 in 198
Millennials Have Been Prevailing Force Behind Home Purchases During COVID pandemic
According to a recent survey by realtor.com, Millennials have been the dominant demographic group of homebuyers during the pandemic.
This reality makes perfect sense. The realtor.com survey tells us that 75% of Millennials are now working remotely due to the pandemic and 63% of Millennial buyers have been motivated to speed up their home buying plans because of the pandemic.
It also makes complete sense that, according to the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR), the share of first-time buyers hit 36% early into the pandemic in April 2020. Most first-time homebuyers come of “home buying age” at 32, again according to NAR, and the median age of homebuyers in 2020 was 34, smack in the middle of the Millennial demographic.
Millennials and Gen-Zers Are Fluent in Tech
Millennials and Gen-Zers have grown up using tech. They are clearly the most tech savvy generations within all demographic groups and clearly the most comfortable with and trusting of tech.
Zillow tells us that it has seen a +41% traffic uptick on its site as of fall 2020. The reason? Millennials and Gen-Zers are using Zillow and other home listing sites to do their home searches online.
(This reality naturally begs the question of why agents’ commissions continue to be so high when so many prospects are doing much of their home search work and research themselves…but that’s another topic.)
Millennial and Gen-Z Homebuyers are Persistent, Undeterred Buyers
Being that market conditions most everywhere in the country represent an imbalance in supply and demand, 49% of Millennial homebuyers were outbid on a home during 2020. 20% were outbid on multiple homes.
Lastly, due to their fluency with, comfort-ability in and trust of tech, 63% of Millennial buyers made sight-unseen offers on homes they wanted.
Thanks to realtor.com, the National Association of REALTORS®, Zillow and the New York Times.
