National Association of Realtors Profile of Buyers and Sellers 2025

NAR’s 2025 “Profile of Buyers & Sellers”

I look forward to this annual report because it shows us the who, what, when, why and how people move homes. It’s a giant report, with tons of useful information, but I wanted to highlight 10 stats that I found particularly interesting:

1. First-time buyers’ share of home purchases dropped to 21%, the lowest share since the NAR started collecting data in 1981. This figure was 24% the previous year. Prior to the Great Recession (2007–2009), the historical norm was 40%.
   
2. The median age of first-time buyers was 40 (up from 38 last year)! The median age of repeat buyers was 62 (up from 61).
   
3. 26% of home buyers paid cash (no mortgage) for their home, an all-time high level.
   
4. Among home buyers, 61% were married couples, 21% were single women and 9% were single men.
5. 76% of home buyers did not have a child under 18 in their home, the highest share recorded.
   
6. 84% of home buyers were White/Caucasian (they make up roughly 60% of the US population).
7. 91% of home sellers used a real estate agent. Only 5% were FSBO (For Sale by Owner), an all-time low.
   
8. The share of buyers who own more than one home was 18%. (If there are fewer first-time buyers, this statistic rises in percentage terms.)
   
9. The typical home purchased was 1,900 square feet with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms
10. Buyers expect to live in their homes for a median of 15 years, with 28% saying that they were never moving.
    

Fewer people are getting married, fewer people are having kids, and those that have kids are having them later. The rising cost of home ownership both contributes to that and drives shifts in buyer demographics. It’s not that young people don’t want to buy their first home; they just can’t afford it in many cases. But older folks with tons of home equity and large-scale property investors with access to capital can. That’s what you’re seeing playing out in the statistics above.

So far, so depressing. But there’s a silver lining to all this. When affordability improves (through some combination of lower mortgage rates, lower home prices, higher wages, and tax breaks/grants) first-time buyers will rush into the market and overall transaction volumes will increase. That will bring many of these statistics back to “normal.”