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Baby boomers drive record vacation home sales
Bolstered by stock-market gains, affluent Americans bought more than 1.1 million vacation homes last year, according to an annual trade group survey — up 57 percent from 2013 and the most since the survey began in 2003.
The strong sales of second homes contrasted with a weaker year for purchases of principal residences, and also a decline in sales to investors.
Vacation home sales represented a record-high 21 percent of all home purchases in 2014, the National Association of Realtors said Wednesday.
The national lobbying group’s survey of 2,000 homebuyers calculated that 2014 purchases by investors fell about 7 percent to just over 1 million, and purchases by owner-occupants declined 13 percent to 3.2 million. Aging baby boomers boosted the sales, buying homes they plan to retire to, often with help from investments in stocks. The Realtor group said the typical vacation-home buyer in 2014 had a median household income of $94,380, up from $85,600 in 2013.
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Los Angeles Times