Can Millennials Achieve the American Dream?

[Benjamin Riehle]

My dream when I went off to college was to live for free, and achieve the American Dream of owning my own home. In 2007, I bought my first house in Tucson, AZ. I rented out three of the rooms and at 18 years old I was on the way to owning my own home, and was living for free.

Today, I was looking at an article asking the questions, do millennials still want to achieve the American dream of buying their own home? The answer is a definite yes. According to data, 66% believe that they will own a home within the next 5 years. They are facing significant problems with 62% of millennials having less than $1000 in their savings account and a student loan debt on average of $40,000. The numbers are not in favor for millennials to put a conventional down payment on their first house.

While that is not a promising sign, there are a number of conventional and non-conventional options that can help millennials achieve the American dream. First, down payment assistance programs like the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan, and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) mortgage program make the price of an initial down payment even easier for millennial. Another way millennials are able to buy houses is through a down payment assistant program. This is provided through local governments and can include grants, tax credits, and second mortgage loans.

With all of these resources, millennials are not far away from achieving the American dream. While the resources listed above are not conventional in home buying, they are beneficial. Millennials do not need to follow the “norm” of paying rent month after month. Instead, they can achieve the American dream at an extremely young age by using resources at their fingertips.

[Dave Hurt]

I am a Millennial and I get so tired of hearing my fellow Millennial peers complain about the lack of opportunity today, and how we have it so bad, and bla bla bla.  Millennials can absolutely achieve the 'American Dream'.  The problem is they don't want to PUT IN THE WORK for it.

I grew up dirt poor in a trailer park in the rural south.  I busted my you know what to get into college on a partial scholarship and while I was in school I worked 3 - yes 3 - jobs to make ends meet...and still took on some student loan debt.  When I went to grad school I worked the whole time there as well.  Now I work in an office with about 70 people in my age group and all they do is complain about EVERYTHING.  They would much rather spend $500/month on a new car, $1600/month on a snazzy apartment, and go out every night of the week...then they complain about how they don't have any money to save, and their Baby Boomer parents had it so easy compared to them.  

Many of my co-workers remark how it 'must be nice' to own rental properties and my restaurant franchise and they wish they were as 'lucky'...then when I try to talk to them about investing, personal finance, and hustling to build multiple streams of income they just comment "Yeah right I don't have time for that"...I've given several of them copies of 'Rich Dad Poor Dad' and offered to take a few driving for dollars on the weekend and have invited all of them to the meetup I host - NONE have taken me up on it...but then they post pictures on Facebook of them brewery-hopping all weekend and hanging at the pool!  Right...they didn't 'have time'.

I know I'm preaching to the choir here on BP but there is absolutely no excuse! You need to pay a $300/month student loan payment?? Great - drive for Uber on the weekends to make extra income! You can't afford to purchase a home? Rent an $800 apartment instead of $1600 apartment and drive a Honda Civic instead of a brand new SUV...save up a 3.5% down payment and buy a house using FHA backed financing...and stop buying Chipotle and Starbucks every day!

Okay that's the end of my rant - sorry I get a little worked up about this particular topic!