Oldest Millennials Near 40: 1 in 5 are single dads and more than 40 percent do not live with a family of their own.

A big portion of the baby boomer controlled media tends to talk about Millennials as if they are children or young adults. So it should be sobering to many to know that this year, the oldest Millennials are 39-years old. That is not a kid or a young adult. That is a grown person that is beyond the “adulting” stage but somehow the narrative continues to paint Millennials as young avocado toast eating hippies that need to figure it out pronto. Maybe this is a generational thing, but Millennials have faced bigger economic challenges than baby boomers. Housing seems to be the biggest issue given it consumes the largest portion of a household budget. The inability to buy a home is startling whereas many baby boomers were able to purchase homes with one blue collar job – now many households are facing the two income trap. So what can we gather from new data on Millennials as they reach their 40s?

Millennials living with others

One startling stat that separates Millennials from other generations is that they are more likely to live with “non-family” members than other generations:

45 percent of Millennials live with families that are not their own. This is a very big difference and this has a lot to do with the high cost of housing. Many Millennials are living in large metro areas where good jobs reside and to live there, you need to pay up. So this causes a big impact on future plans. For example, say you want to buy a regular home in Seattle:

The standard home in Seattle will cost you $837,767. Keep in mind prices went up during the pandemic as Millennials took a big hit because of the pandemic. You have the challenge of saving for a down payment but Millennials also carry the bulk of the $1.7 trillion in student loan debt.

This year was an anomaly in many ways but right now, student loans have been paused by the government and there is record low interest rates combined with mortgage forbearance. All of this caused record low supply and if you are looking to buy a home today, you are going to have to compete against a lot of FOMO in this market. Putting that aside, many Millennials can’t afford to buy so they look at renting but rental prices have also gone up – so it is no surprise that many are living with others to make ends meet.

Single Millennial dads

Another data point that I have not seen commented much about in the media is the large number of single fathers in the Millennial group:

1 in 5 Millennial dads are single fathers which is dramatically different from other cohorts. There are likely a host of reasons for this but one of them has to do with living arrangements. People delay marriage because of expenses or work, have a child with a partner, and then go their separate ways. This has many downstream impacts – how many will want to buy a house down the road? Splitting childcare costs across two households gets expensive since you don’t get the benefit of economies of scale (e.g., one roof, one internet bill, etc.). Many people buy homes to form families – we already have a large portion that has formed families without buying.  

Attitudes are different and we need to see where some of the money is flowing: food, travel (when it opens up fully), crypto, cars, technology, and other non-housing related items. It is time we start talking about Millennials as mature Americans since they are now entering into their 40s. The hippie narrative carried out by the boomer media isn’t holding water anymore.    

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