Millennials Have Arrived at the Home Buying Market—and They Know Exactly What They’re Looking For.
Millennials comprise a generation now larger in numbers than that of the baby boomers. Young adults who began their career journeys during the peak of a national socio-economic crisis, many of them have deferred the conventional milestones typically associated with homeownership. They are a generation with no qualms about doing things on their own time and terms, and it’s a mindset they carry with them into the home buying process.
Having grown up in an era more advanced, with more options, and moving faster than ever before, millennials entered into adulthood with a strong sense of what’s important to them. And what matters to a young, millennial adult today isn’t always the same as what was important to the generations that have preceded them.
To better understand what a prospective young buyer might be looking for in a piece of Beverly Hills real estate to call their own luxury home, it helps to understand the lifestyle and mindset of the Beverly Hills millennial:
Time
You might be wondering how time is an amenity. But if you live in Los Angeles, then you already know that having enough time in the day to get things done is considered an extreme luxury for most people. Now narrow your scope of vision specifically down to the Beverly Hills millennial lifestyle, and you’ll understand why the concept of a home that saves time represents more than a luxury millennial money can buy. Time is an essential value built into the fabric of millennial social currency. What, and with whom, a Beverly Hills millennial spends their time on is a measurement tool for their quality of life, work, friendships, and affluence. And they don’t want to waste it developing and renovating a fixer house.
Brand-new, luxurious turnkey homes that require no maintenance translates into more time invested in careers, social lives and a community of peers for the Beverly Hills millennial.
Location & Convenience
Anyone working in the entertainment industry, the premiere millennial career-builder of Los Angeles, will attest that commute times to and from work make or break a person’s day. By virtue of where the city itself sits within Los Angeles county, owning a valuable piece of Beverly Hills real estate is to own the perks of location and convenience:
- Beverly Hills rests in relative equidistance to major hubs of industry-related work and play. Hollywood, West Hollywood, Culver City, and Santa Monica are all accessible from Beverly Hills without ever having to drive on the freeway… LA’s biggest vortex of time suckage.
- The city offers exquisite access to a multitude of walkable options for unwinding. And options matter to the Beverly Hills millennial. Decadent restaurants, an array of fitness centers, excellent shopping, and gorgeous parks are all close to home when living in Beverly Hills.
- Millennials are social creatures. For those living in Beverly Hills, satiating the need to socialize is just a short Uber ride away from a variety of clubs in West Hollywood and bars on Sunset.
The convenience of having walkable places to caffeinate, like Blue Bottle Coffee, to stock up on supplies like at Whole Foods Market, or to sweat out the stress of the day like SoulCycle, is invaluable to both the Beverly Hills millennial working their hustle from home as it is to the ones on the go. For young homeowners rooted in the area, options to get what they need when they need it, coupled with the city’s location itself, is part of the prestige of living in Beverly Hills.
Technology
“There’s an app for that,” is a phrase embedded into the DNA of millennial dialogue. They understand and embrace technology because they were born to wield it. Millennials grew into adulthood during the rise of the digital age, with global information and cutting edge technology as accessible a plaything as Legos were to their parents. Having the ability to control any aspect of the home through technology, with the touch of an app or the ease of voice command, is a tantalizing feature for a majority of Beverly Hills millennials.
To the young Beverly Hills real estate owner, the difference between simply buying a house versus owning an extravagant smart home lies in how quickly that home’s amenities can solve everyday problems with minimal human effort:
- SMART LIGHTS. A fundamental imperative for any smart home that can be automated and controlled via an app, or through voice command. Cnet currently ranks Philips Hue LED bulbs as one of the best in automated home illumination, offering a wide range of options for high-end homes that pair directly with Alexa and Google Assistant via Bluetooth.
- SMART LOCKS. Once upon a time in Hollywood, a gate monitored by security cameras did the trick when securing one’s multi-million dollar residence. However, millennials looking to buy in Beverly Hills are accustomed to living a two-factor authenticated lifestyle. PC Mag explores the pros, cons, and prices of 2020’s best in smart lock home security options.
- SMART APPLIANCES. 10,000 hours of testing went into Digital Trends’ pick of the Electrolux EFLS527UIW Front-Load Washer with LuxCare Wash System as being the current elite in advanced home machine washing. With smart load sensing technology, automatic water level adjustment and temperature control as but a few of its superior features, the Electrolux EFLS527UIW makes any luxury smart home more time and energy-efficient.
- SMART SPEAKERS. Alexa or Siri? It’s akin to asking if someone prefers Coke or Pepsi. Choosing the right voice assistance platform to weave high tech home amenities together boils down to a matter of taste rather than quality. However, the same can’t be said when selecting the best smart speaker system for said platform. PC Mag’s review of The Best Smart Speakers for 2020 can guide homeowners in finding the best device to house their chosen voice assistant.
While not every Beverly Hills millennial may want an AI for a housemate, homes equipped to make everyday tasks easier tend to compliment the millennial lifestyle in general. For the ones looking to buy in Beverly Hills, owning a smart home can be seen as a wise investment.
Layout
Millennials move fast, in a world moving fast. At a base level, a majority of this generation’s homebuyers on the market want homes that are move-in ready, easy to navigate, and on-trend enough for an HGTV-worthy post to their socials. Millennials ready to buy in Beverly Hills, however, also want to come home to a sense of lavishness and a feeling of escape at the end of a busy day. It’s what they are investing in by owning a piece of Beverly Hills real estate.
To own an elite pocket of property in Beverly Hills is to own a private piece of the oasis, a getaway from the noise and bustle of metropolitan Los Angeles, where character is key and layout is crucial:
- Homes with open floor plans, ones that conjure an airy feeling of expansiveness, triumph in the eyes of a Beverly Hills millennial investing in the luxury of solitude amidst an urban sprawl. Open floor plans also compliment the atmosphere of interconnectivity that a high tech smart home brings to everyday living.
- Sweeping windows and glass walls with automated solar shades allow young homeowners to either observe the world outside their oasis or completely disengage if they so choose.
- Layouts that include an outdoor kitchen with a built-in gas grill and food prep area not only accent a Beverly Hills millennial’s high tech home with the creature comforts of nature, but they also provide options for entertaining guests that capitalize on Southern California’s weather.
A Beverly Hills millennial investing in property looks at the ability of a property’s layout in serving as a natural extension of its owner’s lifestyle. And the lavishness of that lifestyle doesn’t necessarily equate to the level of grandeur a home has, more so than it equates to the home’s capacity to transition from one thing to the next with minimal effort.
Pet-friendly
While the home-buying decision process of other generations have been influenced by motivators like marriage and starting a family, millennials consider the desire to give their four-legged family members a better life as a more important motivating factor in the equation.
A luxury home in Beverly Hills can, and should be, as indulgent an oasis for millennial pets as it is for the home and pet owner:
- A shaded dog run blanketed with natural grass, separate from the yard, can give both pets and owners peace of mind in differentiating areas of play between areas of “business.”
- Indoor cameras with smart technology allow pet owners to check in on their furry companions during the day from the convenience of a phone or laptop.
- Pet-washing stations with temperature-controlled flooring make bath time easier for the owner, more comfortable for the pet, and more sanitary for the house.
Some millennials prefer to wait until later on in life before starting a family of their own, if that’s even on an individual millennial’s checklist of life goals. Nevertheless, a majority of them regard their pets as the children they have now and want nothing but the best for their fur-babies.
Millennials come with an instinctual awareness of their own empowerment to research before making financial commitments to anything. Most on the market will have done a virtual walk-through of properties in consideration and assessed included amenities before setting foot inside of the property itself. Amenities that speak to millennials ready to buy a slice of Beverly Hills real estate are ones that effortlessly lean into the generational trends of their time.
If you’re looking to buy in Beverly Hills, Rochelle Maize has years of experience helping people find dream homes with amenities that best compliment and reflect the lifestyles of her clients. Get in touch so she can answer any questions you have about the home-buying process and help you make an offer.
