When Buying a House, You’re So Predictable

Personality traits can help predict real estate decisions, according to two new studies. In one, researchers administered a widely used assessment test to more than 1,100 people to establish their personality types, and then asked questions about their real estate preferences. Among the findings, the results indicated that extroverts favor real estate investments over the stock market and that conscientious people lean toward fixed-rate home loans. Neurotic people, meanwhile, prefer homeownership and a mortgage with a lower loan-to-value ratio, possibly because they are more averse to risk. In the other study, researchers reviewed personality test results for about 1.6 million people and matched them with housing data from the U.S. Census and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The results reveal that states with relatively high marks for Openness (artistic and imaginative), such as South Carolina, tend to choose fixed-rate mortgages; while more Agreeable (forgiving and undemanding) states, like Tennessee, prefer owning to renting. | Read More