In the US, wealth of households 75+ rose 38%, while under-35s fell 23% — Fortune

In the United States, the median net worth of households headed by people aged 75 and older increased by 38% after inflation from 2022 to 2025. At the same time, this figure for households whose head was under 35 fell by 23%, Fortune reports, citing an analysis by Nick Maggiulli based on data from the latest Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances.

The median net worth of the oldest group rose from $366,288 to $504,600 in 2025 dollars. For the youngest group, by contrast, it fell from $42,725 to $32,820. Thus, households headed by people aged 75 and older had approximately 15 times more wealth than households headed by people under 35, while three years earlier the gap was about ninefold.

Overall growth concealed the age gap

For all American families, median net worth increased by only 2% after adjusting for inflation, to $215,900. According to Nick Maggiulli, chief data officer at Ritholtz Wealth Management, no other age group recorded a change in median wealth of more than 6% in either direction.

Americans aged 55 and older now own approximately $140 trillion, or about three-quarters of the country’s total net worth. This conclusion was included in an analysis by the Bank of America Institute cited by the publication.

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Housing and investments

Maggiulli links the gap to the structure of assets. Older households had a larger share of their wealth in housing and financial investments, whose values rose. Younger Americans were more often not homeowners and had a larger share of assets in cars, whose values declined.

The share of homeowners among households headed by people under 35 declined from 38.5% in 2022 to 35.6% in 2025. The decline in this group’s wealth came after a sharp increase during the pandemic period: from about $18,000 in 2019 to nearly $43,000 in 2022. Even after the decline, their median net worth remained higher than before the pandemic.

The survey does not track the same households in different years. The 75-and-older category also included wealthier members of the baby boomer generation who moved into it between the surveys. Comparing households aged 72 and older in 2022 with the 75-and-older group in 2025 showed a smaller, but still significant, increase of 21%.