Visualizing assets by generation

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Image from Visual Capitalist

Some staggering wealth facts

• baby boomers own half of the nation’s $156 trillion in assets despite making up 21% of the country’s population.
  
• The Great Wealth Transfer - Millennials and Gen X are expected to inherit $84 trillion by 2045. $16 trillion of this could be transferred in the next decade

Assets and Liabilities by generation (table image)

If you are millennial who does not own a home or are behind on your retirement savings, your saving grace could be inheriting a paid off home or investments from your parents. 

If you already own a home, but don’t have income to save, the inherited home could provide a great source of rental income when you are ready to retire. 

Inheriting wealth later in life

Let’s say you are currently 35 and your parents are 65. If they live to be 85 (above average age for Americans), you’ll inherit their property and remaining investments at age 55. 

If your parents live longer, to 90 years old, you’ll inherit their estate at 65, and you might be able to retire a few years early. 

If you inherit a home that you don’t need and can be rented out for $2,000/month, you and another sibling would each get $1,000/month before taxes. After taxes, that would probably be about $800/month in net rental income. 

$800/month is a lot of extra income, especially when you consider that the average social security benefit is currently only $1,781 in 2023. 

You would need to work 32 extra hours in a month at $25/hr to earn $800. The wage amount would actually be higher, because the amount is noted with taxes already removed. 

Generational wealth has huge impacts, because it allows each generation to receive the growth of investments and appreciation of property over time, and it provides more stability for all generations who don’t squander the received assets.