What Millennials Want / The Millennial Mindset

As the housing market prepares to accommodate the next wave of homebuyers, real estate agents should be attuned to the Millennial mindset. Bank of America Merrill Lynch conducted a survey of 1000 adults aged 20-34 across various U.S. cities to determine what Millennials (those born after 1980 through the mid/late 1990s) want.

• Home ownership is highly valued. 73% of survey respondents report that owning a home is either very important (56%) or important (17%) to them, signifying that Millennials possess a strong desire to own their own home, even if they do not own one yet.

• When purchasing a home, Millennials most value 1) price, 2) commute time to work, and 3) home size. The importance placed on other factors vary across demographics. For example, married Millennials value school district over restaurants and entertainment whereas the opposite is true for single Millennials. 

• Millennials prefer the suburbs over the city. 48% of respondents report that they currently live in a suburb and want to live there in the future or live in a city and want to move to a suburb in the future. Contrarily, only 31% of respondents said that they currently live in a city and wish to live in a city in the future or currently live in a suburb but want to move to city. 

• Millennials are minimally concerned about flexibility. While some may argue that a strong rental market means that people highly value the flexibility to move among cities, the majority (69%)  of survey respondents claimed that it was either not very important or only somewhat important to them. This flexibility is more important to single Millennials than married ones, with 35% and 25% citing flexibility as important or very important, respectively.