New data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York shows a surprising phenomenon: The average age of first-time homebuyers getting a mortgage has barely budged over the past two decades, remaining in the mid-thirties. At first glance, that doesn’t seem to make sense. You would think that given the steep rise in home prices versus incomes, it’s primarily the young who delay purchases as they get stuck in rentals waiting for paychecks and banking savings. The evidence says, not so. Expanding on the New York Fed’s findings, a new study from the American Enterprise Institute’s Housing Center concludes that the same problem is haunting would-be buyers at all age levels. “When purchasing power declines, fewer people buy homes at 28—but also fewer purchase at 38 or 48,” writes the author, Housing Center codirector Ed Pinto. “The result is a broad-based drop in homeownership.”
The AEI also points to a disturbing trend that amounts to the de-democratization of American housing. “The less-rich are getting squeezed out, and that trend is uniform across all age groups,” Pinto told Fortune.
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