Why Millennials Are Waiting Longer to Buy Homes — And What It Means for Your Investment Strategy

Four years ago, the median age at which people purchased their first home in the U.S. was 33 years old. Now the age has sharply increased to 40 years old, a record high, according to a National Association of Realtors (NAR) survey of home transactions from July 2024 through June 2025.

NAR released its annual report of home buyers and sellers on Tuesday, painting a picture of a housing market dominated by older buyers who are able to make bigger down payments and pay for homes in cash.

Meanwhile, younger Americans are struggling to become homeowners, encumbered in part by rising home prices and high mortgage rates. The median price of a home in the U.S. reached $415,200 in September, up more than 50% since 2019, per Bloomberg. Mortgage rates are double where they stood in 2021, reaching 6.17% at the time of writing for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages compared to 2.9% in the first half of 2021.

“The implications for the housing market are staggering,” Jessica Lautz, NAR’s deputy chief economist and vice president of research, said in a statement. “Today’s first-time buyers are building less housing wealth and will likely have fewer moves over a lifetime as a result.”

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Close to one-third of first-time home buyers (32%) were between 25 and 34 years old, while one-fourth (25%) were between 35 and 44 years old. The NAR noted that in the 1980s, the typical first-time buyer was in their late 20s.

The trend of delaying home ownership until later in life has a long-term financial impact. When people delay buying a home, they miss out on the money they could have gained as the home’s value increases. Shannon McGahn, NAR executive vice president and chief advocacy officer, said in a statement that Americans can lose “roughly $150,000 in equity,” or $150,000 in financial value that could have been built over time, by delaying buying a home to age 40 instead of 30.

NAR recorded that first-time buyers represented only 21% of the U.S. housing market from July 2024 to June 2025, the lowest percentage since NAR began collecting this data in 1981.

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First-time home buyers indicated that high rent prices and substantial student loan debt delayed their purchase of a home. The average rent for an apartment in the U.S. is $1,750 for an average apartment size of 908 square feet, while the average student loan debt is $39,375 in the U.S.

NAR conducted the study in July, mailing a 120-question survey to 173,250 recent home buyers who purchased a home between July 2024 and June 2025. The sample was randomly selected to be geographically representative of sales across the U.S. NAR received a total of 6,103 responses to the survey.

Four years ago, the median age at which people purchased their first home in the U.S. was 33 years old. Now the age has sharply increased to 40 years old, a record high, according to a National Association of Realtors (NAR) survey of home transactions from July 2024 through June 2025.

NAR released its annual report of home buyers and sellers on Tuesday, painting a picture of a housing market dominated by older buyers who are able to make bigger down payments and pay for homes in cash.