The battered housing market is getting some help from an unlikely
source: retirees. Baby boomers on the cusp of collecting Social
Security are bringing some much-needed vitality to the real-estate
sector as they capitalize on reduced prices and low mortgage
rates by lining up their next homes a few years early.
Before the crash, older home-buyers were already big players
in the real-estate market, and now their influence is growing.
According to the National Association of Realtors, people over
55 bought 21 percent of the homes that were sold in 2008, up
from 13 percent in 2001.
Now, roughly one out of every four baby boomers owns either a
vacation home, land, or a rental property in addition to the home
that they live in. And some shoppers are looking for transitional
homes that they can vacation in now and settle into when they
are ready to retire.
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