First-time buyer share inches up, but median buyer age stands still
“It’s not yet a tsunami, but it is changing who can buy a first home and when. Because people are living longer, the generation receiving that wealth is no longer young adults. Many are reaching middle age before they can buy their first home.”
Personal savings remained the top source of down payment funds at 62%, followed by financial assets — including 401(k)s and stocks — at 30%, and gifts or loans from family at 25%.
Inheritance accounted for 10% of down payment sources, the highest on record. The median first-time buyer down payment sat at 9%.
For brokers, the data describes a client profile that is older and increasingly reliant on capital from outside their own savings.
Matt Gouge, mortgage broker and founding partner at UMortgage, spoke to Mortgage Professional America about first-time buyer flexibility earlier this year: “Buyers, especially first-time homebuyers, have to be a little bit more flexible. They have to start thinking about housing, especially their first house, as a stepping stone, not a forever home.”
