where millennials want to live might surprise you

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Hataishi’s hopes aren’t far off from her peers. A pair of studies released this week suggests that the majority of millennials want to live in the suburbs, have already started buying outside urban areas, and base their homebuying decisions mainly on affordability.

Reports by Zillow and Harvard break with stereotypes of America’s largest generation, namely that they prefer to rent because they favor experiences over building equity and want to live in urban environments.

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Nearly 50 percent of millennial U.S. homeowners were in the suburbs in 2016, 33 percent in an urban area and 20 percent in rural places, said Zillow’s Group Report on Consumer Housing Trends. The report used Census data and a Zillow survey of more than 13,000 homebuyers, sellers, owners and renters.

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The Harvard study found homeownership rates for millennials were 5 percent higher in metro areas where median home prices were 20 percent below the national median. The idea was if millennials could afford to purchase a home, they would, and did so in low-cost markets like Birmingham, Detroit, Minneapolis and St. Louis.

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Of millennial buyers who moved in the past year, 64 percent stayed in the same city and just 7 percent moved to a different state, the Zillow study said.

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