A Credit One Bank survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers found that 79% of Gen Z has delayed, rethought or abandoned at least one major life plan because of cost pressure, according to a Stacker report. A separate TD Bank survey of 2,000 adults found that 75% had put off at least one major goal because of finances, including 85% of Gen Z and 57% of baby boomers, InvestmentNews reported.
The pressures behind those numbers are mostly ordinary ones: housing, groceries, month-end shortfalls, school costs, debt, children and retirement dates. Here are seven of them.
1. Housing Costs
Buying a home was the plan Gen Z delayed most often in the Credit One survey, at 35%. Staying put is its own housing decision, and one survey found 75% of adults 50 and older want to stay in their current homes as they age. Frenz Hub’s roundup of common regrets people experience in adulthood is a reminder of how common second-guessing a big decision can be.
The same survey found that 44% of respondents say housing costs either prevent them from saving at all (23%) or are their biggest financial stressor (21%). Among Gen Z, 36% say housing alone blocks saving, and 29% name rent or mortgage as their top strain, versus 16% of baby boomers. About 30% of boomers own their home outright and feel little housing pressure, though what baby boomers were promised about retirement does not always hold up.
2. Grocery and Household Staples
Credit One found that 40% of respondents name groceries and household staples as their top strain, and 83% say managing household costs has become at least somewhat harder over the past two years. The squeeze lands differently by age: 50% of baby boomers put groceries first, compared with 29% of Gen Z. Older households have long leaned on old-school money habits to stretch a grocery budget, and Frenz Hub’s hardest truths to accept in life, according to baby boomers, shows the same generation’s outlook.
3. Month-End Shortfalls
According to Credit One, 57% of respondents routinely end the month with less money than expected, and 29% say it happens more often than not. Some 55% say getting ahead feels completely impossible or like treading water, and only 7% feel better off than two years ago.
That backdrop sits behind two of the plans Gen Z set aside, and deciding which plan to pause is itself one of the common choices in life people end up second-guessing. The numbers: 24% postponed marriage and 22% gave up on starting a business, both figures from the Credit One survey. Money limits reach midlife too, with 81% of surveyed millennials saying they cannot afford a midlife crisis. Frenz Hub’s guide to navigating a fulfilling life is a companion read on the broader balancing act.
4. Education and Job Training
One in three Gen Z respondents, 33%, deferred additional education or job training, the Credit One survey found. Together with housing, marriage, children and business plans, it makes up the five Gen Z milestones the survey tracked.
The picture is not universal. The report says 59% of baby boomers and 54% of Gen X respondents say none of their plans have changed.
5. Debt
Paying off debt was the most common delayed goal in the TD survey, at 23%. Travel followed at 21%, buying a car and buying a home each at 17%, and saving for retirement at 15%.
The spread suggests that for many households, plans are being reshuffled rather than dropped.
6. The Cost of Raising Children
A BMO survey of 2,500 U.S. adults found that 82% of parents say the cost of raising kids has “gotten out of control,” according to BMO’s newsroom. The same release says 45% of parents identify as part of the sandwich generation, supporting children and aging parents at once.
Against that, 29% of Gen Z respondents in the Credit One survey delayed having a child.
7. Retirement Dates
Retirement is the plan older adults are moving. In the Credit One survey, 27% of baby boomers and 24% of Gen X say rising costs pushed back their planned retirement date.
The TD survey adds that 57% of baby boomers have delayed at least one major goal, so the pressure reaches well beyond the youngest adults. Pausing a plan is not the same as dropping it, and the surveys do not say how many of the delayed milestones will eventually happen.
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
Image: Images Money – CC BY 2.0/Wikimedia Commons
