Generational Home Building

In addition to its usual, region-level classification of counties, the HBGI is featuring for Q1 2023 a new segmentation of the housing market based on generational distributions within counties. Using Census Bureau estimates of county-level population age estimates, counties segmented into one of the six distinct generations based on which generation has the highest population share in each county.

The generations were defined as:

• Generation Alpha (Ages 0-9)
• Generation Z (10-24)
• Millennials (25-39)
• Generation X (40-54)
• Baby Boomers (55-74)
• Silent Generation (75+)

Based on the Census data, the Baby Boomer generation has the majority share of population in 2,605 counties. Surprisingly, Gen Z already has the majority share of population in 335 counties while millennials are the majority share in 179. Gen X, the often-overlooked generational group, is the majority share of population in a mere 24 counties. The silent generation and Gen Alpha make up the majority share in no counties.

Key Findings

• Baby Boomer counties make up a majority of single-family home building while Millennial counties control multifamily construction.
• Baby Boomer counties market share of single-family construction has increased since Q4 of 2019, rising 5.5 percentage points to 58.1%, as of Q1 2023.
  • All other generations lost market share over this same period.
  • Millennials’ market share stood at 24.7%, Gen Z at 12.8% and Gen X at 4.3%.
• Millennials market share of multifamily construction has been above 50% since at least 2016. In Q1 2023, it was at 52.3%.
  • Baby Boomers had a market share of 35.5%, Gen Z at 9.4% and Gen X at 2.8%.