Despite making up one-fifth of the population in the top 50 U.S. metros, Americans under age 30 account for less than one-twentieth of mortgage holders there — making it a demographic where mortgage originators truly stand to expand their business, if they can somehow tailor it to meet this audience’s needs.
The data comes from online lending marketplace LendingTree. The company analyzed more than 32,000 anonymized fourth-quarter 2024 credit reports of adults aged 18 to 29 in the 50 largest U.S. metros, and found, specifically, that people younger than 30 make up 4.7% of mortgage holders in those same metros, even though they comprise 20.3% of the adult population there.
Among this age demographic, only 3.1% — roughly one out of every 33 people — have mortgages, according to LendingTree’s study.
What’s more, overall, people 18 to 29 owe a total of $527 billion in mortgage debt, the study found, or 4.2% of all mortgage debt, and mortgages make up 44.6% of all debt held by this group. Compare that to people aged 30 to 39, for instance, who hold $2.7 trillion, or 21.5%, of all outstanding mortgage debt, comprising 68.6% of their total debt load.
However, under-30s appear to fare better in some metros than others. The U.S. metros with the largest share of adults aged 18-29 with mortgages, the study found, were:
- Nashville, Tenn.;
- Indianapolis, Ind.;
- Pittsburgh, Penn.;
- Cincinnati, Ohio; and
- Louisville, Ky.
On the other side of the coin, the U.S. metros with the smallest share of under-30s with mortgages were:
- San Jose, Calif.;
- New York, N.Y.;
- Los Angeles, Calif.;
- Boston, Mass.; and
- Sacramento, Calif.
Not (only) a question of money
Why does this 18-29 population component have such a small share of homeownership? LendingTree takes a stab at that question, suggesting that part of the answer — and the variation in some metros — may be due to generally lower homeownership rates in some larger, more expensive metros, as is the case with New York City.
But, yes, another factor at play is the cost of entry — people under age 30 also are looking for much less expensive homes, perhaps reflecting how much they believe they can spend.
The LendingTree study found that prospective buyers aged 18-29 looked for houses that only cost about one-quarter of the average price that older prospective buyers look at. The company reported that these younger buyers using its platform looked for mortgages to purchase homes costing an average of $92,332 in the 50 largest metros in 2024, which is, again, a sizeable 75% lower than the average of $367,681 for homes for which older buyers searched.
This study fits with what others have been finding as well. For example, the median age of first-time homebuyers hit 38 years last year, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), and that’s a big change from several decades ago. Back in 1991, the median age of first-time homebuyers was a youthful 21.
But, rather than simply being a problem of not having enough money for a home purchase, the issue for first-time homebuyers also includes the presently poor state of the housing market: home prices and mortgage rates both remain high, and costs like insurance, taxes, and maintenance/ repairs also are up significantly.
And, meanwhile, all this comes against a backdrop of decreasing rental costs, such that renting a median-priced unit is now more affordable for median wage earners than buying the median-priced for-sale home listed in all but two major U.S. metros, as Realtor.com reported last week.
