MORTGAGE RATES ARE high. So is the cost of living. Life milestones are coming later. The reasons that millennials are, according to society, "behind" previous generations when it comes to home ownership are finally crystal clear (and they have nothing to do with avocado toast, thankyouverymuch). But what do the statistics say about home-buying in Houston?

The millennial generation, defined as individuals born between 1981 and 1996, has reached a point in life in which buying a home is cited as a top priority. Thanks to the brutal combination of high interest rates and low inventory, though, it's become a daunting task. But a recently released report details this generation's level of participation in real estate markets across the country.

Construction Coverage, which covers building, insurance and real estate news, says that millennials accounted for the majority of home purchase loans in Houston last year — 61.5 percent, compared to 56.9 percent nationally. States with the highest percentage of millennial homebuyers were California, Texas, and a majority of the midwest and northeast. States at the bottom of the list included, in a post-Covid plot twist, Arizona and Florida.

The median loan amount for mortgages taken out by applicants ages 25-34 in the Houston-Woodlands-Sugar Land metro was $315K, and shot up to $365K for those ages 35-44 — higher than any other age group. The median interest rate for the nearly 30,000 combined transactions was 6.5 percent.

The loan-to-value ratio, defined as the amount of the mortgage compared to the sale price of the home, was a whopping 87 percent for the 25-to-34-year-olds, and 80 percent for 35-to-44-year-olds. A contributing factor may be that many are first-time homebuyers, and have less equity to apply to new mortgages; in addition, many already have young and growing families, and need more space than previous generations' "starter homes" would have.

So what does this mean? In order to cope with rising home prices, millennials are taking out larger home loans than ever before, nationwide and here in Houston.