89% of American Adults Do NOT invest in Real Estate

[David Krulac]

Sometimes as real estate investors and posters at Bigger Pockets, we think that either everybody is a real estate investor or should be a real estate investor.  After all everybody who posted on Bigger Pockets is either a real estate investor or somebody who wants to be a real estate investor.  Actually we are in a very small minority.

There are around 321 million people in United States, of which 247 million are adults, and approximately 28 million  are real estate investors or about 11%

Why so 89% of people do not invest in real estate?  Some have no desire to invest.  Some don't know how to invest, here's where BP comes into play.  Some favor other investments, they like the stock market, and despite low yields people still invest in CDs.  Just saw an ad yesterday where they were touting a limited time offer of CDs paying a whopping 1%.  Wow, lets all jump on that before it goes away.  And some people don't want to do the work that real estate investing requires.  Even if you have property management, you still have to watch the managers, review the property performance, and change directions if necessary.  Its easier to buy that 1% CD than it is to buy real estate.  And of course some people don't have the money to start in real estate.  I've written here many times that I started with nothing and bought the first 11 properties essentially with no money.  It can be done, its a lot easier to start if you have some money or access to money, but it can be done.

Here's a BP study of real estate investors:

https://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2012/09/2...

David Krulac

BP Podcast #82 guest