Millennials Defy Predictions and Are Buying Homes in the Suburbs
COST Commentary: Total driving is increasing as the economy improves slowly and population continues to increase ; and, millennials are buying homes in the suburbs, much to the dismay of planners who, in large part, predicted reduced automobile driving due to millennial preferences for living in city central core areas and favoring public transit. These predictions more poorly represent the future as they do not fully consider other elements of transportation’s paradigm shift such as massive increases in car sharing and driverless cars. Following are three articles: The first is an article published in March 2014, reflective of many planners, consultants and “believers” in their unfounded vision of millennials driving less, using transit and living in higher density; a myth spread widely in numerous articles and presentations. The next two are articles written just a year later which describe the myths and facts regarding millennials and their lifestyle preferences. As you will see, the myths of the first article and the facts of the next two articles present a very different picture.
The incorrect assumptions and predictions of millennial preferences provide the foundation for transportation policies of many transit agencies and city planners as well as a large number of elected officials. This disconnect with reality will waste billions of tax dollars on high-cost, ineffective transit, delaying their ability to effectively address growing congestion throughout most major cities, including Austin.
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Nielsen
MILLENNIALS PREFER CITIES TO SUBURBS, SUBWAYS TO DRIVEWAYS
CONSUMER | 03-04-2014
Millennials are the social generation, both online and in-person. As the founders of the social media movement, they’re never more than a few clicks away from friends and family. And offline, they prefer to live in dense, diverse urban villages where social interaction is just outside their front doors.
Breaking from previous generations’ ideals, this group’s “American Dream” is transitioning from the white picket fence in the suburbs to the historic brownstone stoop in the heart of the city. And their dreams have the power to affect cities and towns across the U.S. According to Nielsen’s recent Millennials – Breaking the Myths report, those aged 18-36 are 77 million strong, or 24 percent of the population—the same as Baby Boomers (between 49-67 years old). As Millennials continue to come of age and control an increasing share of the economy, understanding how their diversity and values play into their lifestyle and purchasing preferences will be essential to appeal to this generation of consumers.
A METROPOLITAN FEEL HAS A MILLENNIAL APPEAL
Millennials like having the world at their fingertips. With the resurgence of cities as centers of economic energy and vitality, a majority are opting to live in urban areas over the suburbs or rural communities. Sixty-two percent indicate they prefer to live in the type of mixed-use communities found in urban centers, where they can be close to shops, restaurants and offices. They are currently living in these urban areas at a higher rate than any other generation, and 40 percent say they would like to live in an urban area in the future. As a result, for the first time since the 1920s growth in U.S. cities outpaces growth outside of them.
The markets where Millennials are most highly concentrated reflect their desire to live in more socially conscious, creative environments. Austin, Texas has the highest concentration of this group—almost 1.2 times the national average—and fits the Millennial ideal, combining urban convenience with an exciting art and music scene. Within Austin, most Millennials are found near the city core and less in the suburban and rural areas. With the exception of Washington D.C., the top markets for Millennials are in the western portion of the country, unlike their Boomer counterparts who are mostly highly concentrated on the East Coast. And the growing young population in the Western U.S. will affect demand in these areas.
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Forbes / Leadership
by Travis Bradberry, MAR 6, 2015
Every Big Cliché about Millennials Is Wrong
As every new generation enters the workforce, it never ceases to amaze me how quickly their generation is labeled with “attributes” that are common to young people. These attributes tend to stick, and they quickly become inaccurate as the generation ages (assuming they were even accurate in the first place).
Nowhere is this more evident than with Millennials, who by 2020 will make up more than 50% of the US workforce.
That’s why it’s so great to see that IBM decided we should quit making assumptions, and they conducted a global study that aimed to uncover what Millennials are really all about.
Here’s what they found:
Myth 1: Millennials have unrealistic career goals.
Fact: As it turns out, Millennials are just like everyone else in the workplace. They’re after financial and job security, first and foremost. And who can blame them? That’s a big part of why we work in the first place. So don’t expect your younger workers to make unrealistic requests of you and your company.
Myth 2: Millennials expect endless praise because they were raised in a culture of “everyone gets a trophy.”
Fact: Not only are Millennials not after endless praise, their #1 preference in a boss is the same as Boomers. Both want a fair boss who freely shares information. As it turns out, it’s Gen Xers who believe that everyone involved in a successful project should be rewarded, and members of this generation are in their early 30s-50s. Sounds like they are the ones misappropriating their inadequacies onto younger workers.
Myth 3: Millennials are so addicted to technology that they lack boundaries between their work and private lives.
Fact: This one is quite the opposite. Millennials are actually much less likely to blur the boundaries between their work and personal lives because they’ve been raised with technology. Hence, they’ve been bred on the nuances that older workers fail to understand. In fact, they are 4X more likely than Boomers to keep their work and personal lives separate when it comes to technology. It’s the old dogs that are having trouble learning new tricks.
Myth 4: Millennials are afraid to make decisions for themselves.
Fact: Millennials are no more likely than Generation X to seek group consensus when making decisions. They simply aren’t as timid about making decisions as everyone thinks they are. And, contrary to the mistaken assumption that Millennials have a tendency to buck authority, more than 50% of them trust their company’s leadership to make decisions that are sound.
Myth 5: Millennials will quit if their job doesn’t fulfill their passions.
Fact: When it comes to changing jobs, Millennials are actually just like everybody else. The #1 reason they leave is for money. And just like Boomers and Generation X, Millennials are 2X more likely to leave a job for money than they are because it fails to fulfill their passions.
Bringing It All Together
You are making a grave mistake anytime you allow generational stereotypes to affect how you treat employees. Even worse, companies often make wholesale changes based upon what they assume younger workers want.
Just as we learned from the IBM study, there’s a tried and true method to ensure this never happens to you. Talk to your Millennials and find out what they want, because it’s likely a far cry from what you’d expect.
Note: The IBM
Travis co-wrote the bestselling book Emotional Intelligence 2.0 and co-founded TalentSmart.
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Bentley University
Why Millennials Are Moving to Suburbs and Smaller Cities
by April Lane, May 21, 2015
Some of the biggest myths about millennials and their lifestyle preferences are that they all want to be car-free in urban areas, with public transportation and car-sharing options, and they still can’t afford to get married or buy their own homes, single and renting or living at home. But it looks as though millennials are finally growing up, having kids, moving to the suburbs, and “becoming their parents,” even if they don’t know it yet — or have the choice.
A while back, Forbes reported in “Millennial Boomtowns: Where The Generation is Clustering (It’s Not Downtown” that the majority of millennials (those currently aged 20 to 29) aren’t living downtown, or even in the top 10 major cities, as many assume:
“Like most of America, the millennials are far more suburban, more dispersed and less privileged than what one sees on shows such as “Girls” or read about in accounts in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Reality is often more complex, and less immediately compelling, than the preferred media narrative. But understanding the actual geography of [millennials] may provide a first step to gaining wisdom about how to approach and understand this critically important generation.”
Competition for jobs from baby boomers reluctant to retire, being priced out of top urban metro areas by international investors, as we see here in Boston, and simply the freedom of telecommuting is giving millennials more expanded options, including living in suburbs and smaller cities where the cost of living is more accessible. Clickhole explores the plight of these ‘up-and-coming millennials, among those hit hardest by the sluggish economy, looking for the next affordable, undiscovered city to settle in,’ which we explored in more depth in our 2015 Millennial Predictions and list of The New Best Cities for Millennials.
What’s most surprising to many is which cities have seen the largest increases in their millennial populations, and how young people choose where to live, recently explored by both Yahoo! news and US News & World Report.
“It is dogma among greens, urban pundits, planners and developers that the under 30 crowd doesn’t like what Grist called ‘sprawling car dependent cities,” Joel Kotkin writes for Forbes. “Too bad no one told most millennials. What [actually] emerges…is a picture of a millennial America that does not much mirror the one suggested in most accounts. The metro areas with the highest percentages of millennials tend, for the most part, to be not dense big cities but either college towns — Austin, Texas; Columbus, Ohio, for example — or Sun Belt cities.”
Cities like Charlotte, NC have seen their fair share of millennial transplants, and the Charlotte Observer reports that despite their preference for mass transit, millennials are embracing cars as a tradeoff to the lower overhead and higher quality of life available in these smaller cities. Millennials — also known as Generation Y — accounted for 27 percent of new car sales in the U.S. last year, up from 18 percent in 2010, according to J.D. Power & Associates. They’ve zoomed past Gen X to become the second-largest group of new car buyers after their boomer parents. Millennials are starting to find jobs and relocating to the suburbs and smaller cities, where public transport is spotty.
“The millennial generation is a diverse bunch, but there are a few common threads that tie them together,” writes Nicole Schreck for US News. “Millennials often value experiences and look at their lives in a different way than previous generations did — and they’re certainly not afraid to shake things up. In fact, according to a recent Rent.com survey of 1,000 U.S. renters ages 18 to 34, nearly half say they moved to a city other than the one they grew up in.”
Those experiences include not waiting any longer to become parents due to the “suspended adulthood” that has plagued their generation, and the Washington Post recently debated what will happen to cities when millennials have kids and the suburbs beckon.
“Previous generations mostly moved to the suburbs, and there is evidence that many millennials also want to live in suburban single-family homes, even if they live in cities right now. Picket fence and all. But in urban planning circles, there is a burgeoning movement to figure out how to better accommodate young families before they depart.”
One thing is for certain as millennials reach parenthood: For investors, their money is on the ‘Burbs, according to Business Insider.
“Especially in the older millennials, we’re seeing a move towards more traditional patterns, just on a delayed time frame,” said Sarah House, an economist at Wells Fargo. “A generation that’s been stereotyped as urban, single, and aghast at the idea of a car-based life in the suburbs is starting to age, prompting fund managers to bet on companies that should benefit if the U.S. birth rate reverses a six-year slump. With 4.3 million millennials turning 30 this year and the number set to jump to 4.6 million by 2020, there will soon be more adults in their early 30s than at any other time in U.S. history, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data.”
April Lane is a freelance writer.
Learn more about Bentley’s PreparedU Project, which examines challenges facing millennial workers, the companies that employ them and the colleges and universities that prepare them.