A house is not a home — a look at millennials and their buying power

Millennials have been a hot topic for the housing industry worldwide. Why? Because this next generation is unlike any other with respect to marketing.

Corporations like Visio Financial Services know the power of investing in critical research to delve into how this generation ticks. Visio is one of the leading residential real estate marketplace lenders in the United States.

Prior to forming Econohomes and Visio Financial Services, president and CEO of Visio Financial Services, Jeff Ball, led JPMorgan’s semiconductor device investment banking business.

At JPMorgan, his clients included some of the largest technology companies in the world, including Intel and Texas Instruments. In this position, he counseled CEOs and boards of directors during times of growth, strategic expansion and crisis. Ball has been an important cog in the wheel of finance for some time. He has seen the market at its worst and now is witnessing its recovery.

Ball currently oversees the strategic direction and growth of the company. Since founding the company in 2011, he has grown Visio to become one of the largest lenders of its kind. Ball shared some insights about what millennials are craving in this new frontier of lending and buying real estate.

Visio shared these statistics from its recently published 2015 Real Estate Investor Survey, which was compiled to shine light on how its customer base is shifting.

Approximately 40 percent of the company’s borrowers are from minority populations; a quarter are female and more than 20 percent are under the age of 35.

“We are witnessing a major shift in technology and how it serves the consumer,” Ball said. “We are financing millennials, and this group expects more than just a tweak to their customer service experience. They expect to operate in an automated manner, with the flexibility to move between automated and human interactions.”

Ball and his leadership team saw the gap in the mortgage market for residential real estate investors. “Millennials place a high premium on the ease of use (of interacting in the transaction) and uniformity of the transaction as a whole. They want speed, simplicity and transparency,” Ball advised. He feels that when working with this group, a uniform system is key to keeping this customer base satisfied.

“There is a fair amount of data out there that suggests that this generation values tangible assets,” Ball said. “There is a trend with millennials that a home is just housing and just one part of their financing future. Across the board, we are seeing more homeowners rent their properties and treat them more as an investment. People are less emotionally attached to their homes and want to make good long-term investments.”

Forecasting the future of what challenges lie ahead for both professionals and consumers is not an easy task. Thankfully, the future looks promising, with improvements for all parties involved if this proven formula continues to guide the industry: Better technology plus better customer service equals happy consumers.

Check out Visio and explore more about this topic.

Original article: http://www.inman.com/2015/05/27/a-house-is-not-a-home-a-look-at-millennials-and-their-buying-power/