The concept of "starter homes" — they're renting longer and buying expensive houses later

Zillow

Contrary to popular belief, millennials are interested in purchasing homes. They're just waiting longer to buy.

A September report from the real-estate website and app Zillow found that millennials — i.e., people between the ages of 18 and 34 — are the largest group of homebuyers in the US. (The median age of a homebuyer is 36.)

Spencer Rascoff, Zillow's CEO, has some insight into why millennials are delaying their first home purchases. On an episode of Business Insider's podcast, "Success! How I Did It," Rascoff broke it down for our US editor-in-chief, Alyson Shontell:

"As a result of limited starter-home inventory, they're renting longer. And when they buy their first home, they're buying a much nicer home than a prior generation," he said.

"I mean, many people are basically skipping starter homes; they're renting until their 30s, and that first house they buy is a million dollars, and they just are not even buying the $200,000, $300,000, $400,000 home, which is a total mind shift as compared with previous generations. So they're still buying homes — they're just buying them later and buying them bigger."