The eldest of the Millennial generation turns 36 this year while the youngest will be turning 20. At 75 million strong, Millennials already outnumber the Baby Boomers, which was the second largest generation in history. This generation is unique in so many ways, having come of age in a different world than the world their parents grew up in. That uniqueness extends to their housing preferences, which are a set of factors that every home builder will need to know in order to create a residential development for Millennials. Let’s dig in and take a look at what housing preferences Millennials want!
Understanding Millennial Housing Preferences
To gain a clear understanding of the things that Millennials are looking for, it is helpful to look at the key insights in a report produced by Whirlpool in 2012. As it turns out, there are four key factors that drive buying decisions among this generation: money, health, time and technology.
- Millennials want a secure financial future and they want to feel that their purchase decisions were good decisions.
- The need to protect health and overall wellbeing is huge, which means that many Millennials are active and lead lives centered around safeguarding physical and mental health.
- For a Millennial’s busy lifestyle, time management is key. This generation wants to streamline as much as possible so that they can spend more time doing the things they love.
- Millennials are the first generation to grow up with the internet, so for them, technology needs to be within easy reach.
How These Factors Affect Millennial Housing Preferences
Each of these four factors contributes to the ways that Millennials feel about housing. For instance, this generation loves walkable communities for a variety of reasons. It gives them a way to be active and therefore be healthier, it makes it easier to manage time when work or shopping opportunities are right around the corner, and it saves them money on fuel, cars and other factors related to traveling longer distances.
When it comes to technology, Millennials are looking for places that are connected. For instance, the lobby of an apartment building or a high rise condo is no longer just a lobby. Instead, it doubles as a functional space where people can take their laptops and other connected devices to use the Wi-Fi. In a single-family home, connectivity means that homes should be wired for the future. Builders these days are making sure that homes feature built-in ethernet cables that connect important zones to a centralized router while also ensuring that wireless access is available throughout the home.
What about financial security? For most Millennials, this means smart construction and energy saving ideas. They’re looking for the types of insulation and building materials that can conserve the most energy and they also want appliances and fixtures that save electricity and water — like LED lighting, low-flow toilets and windows with protective coatings that create a better thermal barrier against heat gain and loss. At the same time, cost proves to be a barrier for many members of this generation, which is why solar panels are still not widespread despite their benefits. Millennials are striking a careful balance between construction costs and future savings.
The Millennial generation, aside from being the largest in history, is also the most diverse in history. When it comes residential development for Millennials, it is unwise to paint a picture in wide strokes. However, if you know some of the key things that are important to a majority of this generation, then you’ll find it much easier to design a residential development to suit their needs.
Recent Comments