Millennials Now Largest Home Buyers Percentage of Graduates with College Debt 2004 to 2014
August 21,
2016 by in General 
This is the second of two series profiling Millennials. Last series explored demographically how the Millennials have altered the population, income, education, and household characteristics of young adults. This series delves into Millennial home buying trends, shopping attitudes and habits and whether they lend themselves to home furnishings purchases in the future. Millennials, ages approximately 17 to 34, represent the largest generational cohort in history with numbers exceeding 83 million.
Due to high unemployment rates, lower marriage rates, and a fallen median income, Millennials are arriving late to the home buying industry and in turn the home furnishings industry. But studies show many Millennials actually would prefer to own rather than rent, but opportunity and financial barriers are hindering them. These first-time home buyers have been sitting out the housing recovery largely because of financial reasons. The Great Recession ushered in a poor job market and the first factoid in this series shows the rising percentage of graduates with college debt.
According to The Institute for College Access and Success (TICAS) Project on Student Debt, the graduates with debt grew from 65 percent in 2004 to 69 percent in 2014 to an average of $28,000. In fact, the Census Bureau reports that one in five young adults is living in poverty, up from one in seven in 1980.
The next factoid will show the slow to rise median income among Millennials and how that has added to a delay in what should become an influx of young adults buying homes.
Source: Institute for College Access and Success