Home Buying Patterns of Seniors

Two New Studies Look at Homebuying Patterns of Older Americans 

Slightly more than half of older second home owners spend two weeks or less in their second homes and two-thirds spend fewer than four weeks. This perhaps indicates that most of these second homes are held for investment rather than recreation. Only 12.9 percent plan to make their second home their main residence in the future. The HRS study is longitudinal so the authors were able to conclude that, of those second home owners identified in the study in 1998, 45 percent owned only one home by 2004 and to extrapolate that the typical second home belonging to older households is owned for 15 years before being sold. For the typical second home owner, equity in that home represented only 13 percent of the household wealth.

The study's most surprising conclusion about second home ownership among the Boomers included in the data is that they were no more likely to own such homes than those who preceded them by one or two generations.