Millennials Average Net Worth Explained
Millennials Average Net Worth Explained
There is no single official number for millennial net worth, because the Federal Reserve does not publish wealth by generation. It publishes wealth by age group. Millennials, born between 1981 and 1996, were ages 29 to 44 in 2025, so they fall into two Federal Reserve age groups: families headed by someone under 35, and families headed by someone 35 to 44.
Here is the short answer, from the Federal Reserve 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances, released on October 9, 2026. For families headed by someone under 35, the median net worth was $33,000 in 2025, and the average, or mean, was $135,400. For families headed by someone 35 to 44, the median net worth was $155,600 in 2025, and the average was $681,900.
Who Counts as a Millennial
Pew Research Center defines millennials as people born between 1981 and 1996. By that definition, the oldest millennials turned 44 in 2025 and the youngest turned 29.
That age range matters for reading the Federal Reserve data. The Survey of Consumer Finances groups families by the age of the family reference person, usually the head of the household. It does not ask whether someone is a millennial. So a 33 year old millennial and a 24 year old Gen Z worker both sit in the under 35 group, while a 40 year old millennial and a 44 year old Gen X worker both sit in the 35 to 44 group.
What Net Worth Means
Net worth is simple. It is everything you own minus everything you owe. The Federal Reserve states it the same way in its survey report: net worth is the difference between a family gross assets and its liabilities.
Assets are things of value that you own: money in checking and savings accounts, retirement accounts such as a 401(k) or an IRA, stocks and funds, the value of a home you own, a car, and a business you own. Debts are what you owe: a mortgage, student loans, car loans, and credit card balances.
If your assets add up to $60,000 and your debts add up to $25,000, your net worth is $35,000.
The Federal Reserve notes that net worth alone does not fully capture a family economic situation. It does not include the future value of Social Security or a pension that pays a monthly amount rather than holding a balance.
The Millennial Numbers: 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances
The table below is the official picture, from Table 2 of the Federal Reserve report Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2022 to 2025, published in October 2026. All figures are in 2025 dollars, and age is the age of the family reference person.
| Age of reference person | Median net worth, 2025 | Average (mean) net worth, 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Under 35 | $33,000 | $135,400 |
| 35 to 44 | $155,600 | $681,900 |
| 45 to 54 | $253,700 | $1,244,500 |
| 55 to 64 | $411,900 | $1,878,000 |
| 65 to 74 | $431,300 | $1,897,600 |
| 75 or older | $504,900 | $1,962,200 |
| All families | $215,900 | $1,241,500 |
Read the two millennial rows this way. Half of families headed by someone under 35 had a net worth below $33,000 in 2025, and half had more. The average for that group was $135,400, more than four times the median. Half of families headed by someone 35 to 44 had a net worth below $155,600, and half had more, while the average was $681,900.
For context, the median net worth for all American families in 2025 was $215,900, and the average was $1,241,500. The oldest families, those headed by someone 75 or older, had the highest median net worth in 2025, at $504,900.
How the Numbers Changed Since 2022
The previous survey was the 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, published in October 2023. The figures below are the 2022 survey results in 2022 dollars, from Table 2 of the Federal Reserve report Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2019 to 2022.
| Age of reference person | Median net worth, 2022 | Average (mean) net worth, 2022 |
|---|---|---|
| Under 35 | $39,000 | $183,500 |
| 35 to 44 | $135,600 | $549,600 |
| 45 to 54 | $247,200 | $975,800 |
| 55 to 64 | $364,500 | $1,566,900 |
| 65 to 74 | $409,900 | $1,794,600 |
| 75 or older | $335,600 | $1,624,100 |
| All families | $192,900 | $1,063,700 |
The change between the two surveys, after adjusting for inflation, was uneven. Families headed by someone under 35 saw median net worth fall 23 percent, from $42,700 in 2025 dollars to $33,000, and their average net worth fell 33 percent, to $135,400. The Federal Reserve report says these declines were driven mainly by the unwinding of business equity gains recorded between 2019 and 2022. Families headed by someone 35 to 44 moved the other way: their median net worth rose 5 percent after inflation, to $155,600, and their average rose 13 percent, to $681,900.
Across all families, median net worth rose 2 percent after inflation, to $215,900, and average net worth rose 7 percent, to $1,241,500.
Note that the survey does not follow the same families over time, and the figures are survey estimates, so small differences are approximate.
Why the Average Is So Much Higher Than the Median
If the average net worth for families under 35 is $135,400 in 2025, why is the median only $33,000? The answer is that wealth is very unevenly spread. The median is the family in the middle: half above, half below. The average adds up every family net worth and divides by the number of families, so a small number of very wealthy families pulls it far above the middle. For all families, the average was about 5.8 times the median in 2025.
That is why you should compare yourself to the median, not the average. The median tells you where a typical family stands.
A Worked Example With Real Math
Meet Jordan, a 33 year old single millennial. Jordan rents an apartment, has a 401(k) at work, a small Roth IRA, a car, a student loan, and a small car loan. This illustration uses round numbers and lands exactly on the 2025 median for families under 35.
Step one: list the assets, everything Jordan owns that has value.
- Checking and savings accounts: $4,500
- 401(k) retirement account: $18,000
- Roth IRA: $6,000
- Car, current resale value: $11,000
Add them up: $4,500 plus $18,000 is $22,500, plus $6,000 is $28,500, plus $11,000 is $39,500. Total assets are $39,500.
Step two: list the debts, everything Jordan owes.
- Student loan balance: $4,000
- Car loan balance: $2,500
- Credit card balance: $0, paid in full each month
Add them up: $4,000 plus $2,500 is $6,500. Total debts are $6,500.
Step three: subtract debts from assets. $39,500 minus $6,500 equals $33,000. Jordan net worth is $33,000, exactly the median for families headed by someone under 35 in the 2025 survey.
The retirement accounts are more than half of the assets, and the student loan is small here because Jordan has paid most of it down. If Jordan still owed $25,000 on the student loan, net worth would be $12,000 instead. Paying down debt raises net worth dollar for dollar.
What Else the 2025 Survey Found
Homeownership was 66 percent in 2025, about unchanged from 2022. For families that owned a home, the median net housing value, the value of the home minus home secured debt such as a mortgage, rose to $230,000 in 2025 from $218,900 in 2022.
Retirement accounts were held by 54.9 percent of families in 2025, and the median balance for families with account type plans rose 11 percent to $106,000. Stock market participation slipped from 58 percent to 56 percent, but the median holding for stockholders grew 36 percent, to $77,400.
Debt stress rose. The share of families with any type of debt stayed about stable at 77 percent, but the share whose debt payments took more than 40 percent of their income rose from 6.5 percent to 8.6 percent. The share of families with student debt was 20 percent in 2025, down from 22 percent in 2022, and among families with student debt the median balance was $25,600.
How to Work Out Your Own Net Worth
You can run the same calculation in about 20 minutes, with your own statements.
Step 1. List your assets. Write down your checking and savings balances, your retirement accounts, any brokerage or investment accounts, the current value of your home if you own one, and the current value of your car.
Step 2. List your debts. Write down your mortgage balance, student loan balances, car loan balance, credit card balances, and any personal loans. Use the current balances from your statements.
Step 3. Add up each column separately, then subtract total debts from total assets. The result is your net worth today.
Step 4. Compare it with the right row. If the head of your household is under 35, compare with the under 35 median of $33,000 in 2025. If you are 35 to 44, compare with $155,600 in 2025.
Step 5. Repeat the calculation once a year, on the same date, with the same method. The trend matters more than any single number. A net worth that rises a little each year becomes large over a decade.
Our guide on how to create a monthly budget shows how to build the monthly plan that feeds this calculation, and our guide on what is discretionary income explains how to find the money left after essentials that can go toward saving or debt.
Actionable Steps to Build Net Worth
First, pay yourself before spending. Set up an automatic transfer to savings on payday, even a small one. If your employer offers a 401(k), contribute at least enough to get the full employer match. Our guide on how to set up a Roth IRA explains the 2026 contribution limits and income rules if you want an account outside work.
Second, build a small emergency fund first. A buffer of $1,000, then one month of essential costs, stops a surprise bill from becoming new debt.
Third, attack the most expensive debt. List your debts by interest rate, highest first, and put any extra money toward the top one while paying the minimum on the rest.
Fourth, keep housing costs in proportion. For owners, the equity between mortgage and home value matters more than either number alone.
Fifth, check your tax picture once a year. Our guide on federal tax brackets explained walks through the 2026 brackets layer by layer.
Sixth, ignore the average and watch the median. Your goal is to beat your own number from last year.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average net worth of a millennial?
There is no single official millennial figure, because the Federal Reserve reports by age, not by generation. Millennials were ages 29 to 44 in 2025, covering two Fed age groups. In the 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances, families headed by someone under 35 had an average net worth of $135,400 and a median of $33,000. Families headed by someone 35 to 44 had an average of $681,900 and a median of $155,600.
What is the median net worth for millennials?
It depends on which millennials. For the younger group, under 35, the median was $33,000 in 2025. For the older group, 35 to 44, the median was $155,600 in 2025. Both figures are from the 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances, in 2025 dollars.
Why did millennial net worth fall between 2022 and 2025?
For families under 35, median net worth fell 23 percent after inflation between the 2022 and 2025 surveys, and the average fell 33 percent. The Federal Reserve report says the declines were driven mainly by the unwinding of business equity gains recorded between 2019 and 2022. Families 35 to 44 did better, with median net worth up 5 percent after inflation. The survey does not follow the same families over time, so this is a comparison of age groups, not a record of one household.
Is $33,000 a good net worth at 30?
It is the median for families headed by someone under 35 in 2025, which means half of those families had less and half had more. A more useful check is whether your own net worth is higher than it was a year ago, and whether your debts are falling while your savings rise.
Does net worth include my home and my retirement account?
Yes. The Federal Reserve counts a primary residence as an asset and the mortgage as a debt, so only the equity counts toward net worth. Retirement accounts such as a 401(k) or an IRA are counted as financial assets at their current balance.
Where can I read the official numbers myself?
The Federal Reserve published the figures in Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2022 to 2025, released October 9, 2026. Table 2 gives median and mean net worth by age for the 2022 and 2025 surveys. The Federal Reserve press release gives the headline findings, and the full report (PDF) gives the tables.
Conclusion
Millennials are not one number. Born between 1981 and 1996, they were ages 29 to 44 in 2025, and the Federal Reserve data covers them in two age groups. In the 2025 Survey of Consumer Finances, released October 9, 2026, families headed by someone under 35 had a median net worth of $33,000 and an average of $135,400, while families headed by someone 35 to 44 had a median of $155,600 and an average of $681,900.
The change since 2022 was uneven. Younger families lost ground, with median net worth down 23 percent after inflation, while older millennials gained 5 percent. Work out your own net worth with the method in this guide, repeat it once a year, and let the trend tell you whether you are moving forward.
This article is for general information and education only. It is not legal or financial advice.
