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Millennials are finally buying homes — but only when they’re Instagrammable

Elaborate poses, fake eyelashes and posed dancing is all the rage for these first timers

Millennial couple posing for their first time homebuyer photoshoot (Credit: Getty Images)
Millennial couple posing for their first time homebuyer photoshoot (Credit: Getty Images)

From TRD LA: What’s that noise you hear? It’s a broker tapping his toes as he waits an hour for his client to pick up her prized fake eyelashes from home so she can look her best on the “Colorado First Time Home Buyer” Facebook page.

Millennials are turning to elaborate photoshoots as a way to celebrate the milestone that is buying a first home, the Wall Street Journal reported. That includes hiring a photographer to snap pictures of them fake dancing in the living room, playfully posing on the front steps and making heart-shaped hand poses around a new key. Cute, huh?

Some will even wear sweaters and dark jeans in 95-degree Texas weather to strike the right aesthetic. “I wanted that cozy feel,” Dawn Richardson told WSJ. “AHH!! #Adulting,” she wrote on her blog later when posting the temperature-confused pictures.

One photographer who spoke with the Journal was given the added responsibility of photo-shopping grass onto an unkempt lawn. She virtually enhanced the neighbor’s lawn, too. Welcome to the world of home-buying in the digital age.

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People 36 and younger (also known as millennials) were the largest group of home buyers, at 34 percent, from July 2015 until June 2016, according to a National Association of Realtors report. Roughly two-thirds of those buyers were also rookies, according to the March report, the most recent generational data available.

Brokers are taking note of the generation’s affinity towards social media, too.

Corey Maurice Gilmore, a broker in Alabama, usually takes at least 10 pictures of new home buyers, one of which will often end up on his Facebook page. “It’s kind of like a domino effect: I see a lot of people, a lot of circles of friends, buy houses around the same period of time…because they are seeing their friends make home purchases,” he told WSJ.

But others are claiming the photos shared on social media by brokerages are often a scam to convince others to buy similar homes, and that millennials can’t possibly be buying so many homes.

Proud new homeowners counter-commented with their high-resolution images. [WSJ] – Natalie Hoberman

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