Boomers Hold $93 Trillion in Assets—but Their Heirs May Get Less Than Half

Baby boomers hold roughly $93 trillion in assets, but only $36 trillion could reach Gen X and millennial heirs over the next 20 years, according to new data.

The estimate, released last week by Visa Business and Economic Insights, is far below Cerulli Associates’ widely cited projection that as much as $124 trillion could change hands through 2048.

The gulf between the headline figures offers a sobering picture of the Great Wealth Transfer and exposes a basic problem with the way inheritance is often discussed: Assets held today are not the same as wealth available to heirs tomorrow.

"For businesses in big-ticket sectors like housing and travel, this is not a future trend to watch," says Wayne Best, chief economist at Visa. "It is already influencing consumer decisions—and shaping where growth will be distributed in the years ahead."

How retirement can consume an inheritance

The heart of the issue is that the assets held by boomers still have a lot of work to do.

"A lot of people look at the great American Wealth Transfer as something that's going to be smooth, but it shouldn't be looked at as one giant check that gets passed down to the next generation," says Evan Mills, associate financial adviser at Scholar Advising. "That wealth is going to have to go through different tollbooths on the way."

The largest toll is retirement itself. Visa estimates boomers will draw down about $16 trillion over the next 20 years to cover housing, food, healthcare, prescription drugs, and other living expenses.

Those burdens will be especially acute for families with the fewest assets.

"Their position is different from previous generations because the retirement itself costs more, and more of that wealth gets eaten up before it ever reaches an heir," Mills says.

Long-term care can accelerate that drawdown.

"Long-term care, healthcare, housing costs, and taxes on retirement account withdrawals can reduce an estate faster than families expect," explains Zachary Sahar, CPA and managing director at Capital Tax.

The boost and burden of housing wealth

Then there's the debt already attached to boomer balance sheets: credit cards, auto loans, personal borrowing and, increasingly, mortgages.

In 2022, 41% of homeowners aged 65 to 79 carried mortgage debt, up from roughly 24% in 1989. Among homeowners 80 and older, the share reached 31%, up from about 3%, according to the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.

"Rising mortgage debt among older homeowners directly shrinks the size of the eventual inheritance," explains Hannah Jones, senior economist at Realtor.com®. "Balances typically get paid off from the estate, or the home gets sold to cover them, before anything passes to heirs."

Jones is careful to note that those balances don’t necessarily signal distress. Some older homeowners may carry inexpensive debt as part of a deliberate strategy, keeping money invested elsewhere or using accumulated equity to buy later in life.

But the problem for heirs is still the same: A home's market value can look far more substantial on paper than the equity that eventually passes to them. All told, Visa estimates debts to consume $5 trillion of boomers' remaining assets, leaving $72 trillion worth of assets after also accounting for retirement spending.

But even a fully paid-off home isn’t immune, according to Mills.

"The house is usually the last asset left in retirement, so it often turns into a retirement emergency fund before it ever becomes the children’s inheritance," he says.

Again, that risk is greatest for families with the thinnest financial cushion. The bottom 90% of boomer households hold just $16 trillion in wealth, compared with $44 trillion held by households in the 90th to 99th percentiles

To help control for the concentration of wealth, Visa excludes $28 trillion held by the top 1% from its model. And after accounting for debt, retirement spending, taxes, fees, and charitable giving, the report arrives at just $36 trillion left for Gen X and millennial heirs—about 39 cents for every dollar in assets boomers currently hold.

Why the transfer may reinforce the housing divide

To be sure, $36 trillion is still a huge sum. But because nearly three-quarters of recipients are already wealthier than the median household, much of the transfer is likely to help existing owners build on what they have—not bring a new group of buyers into the market.

It stands in such stark contrast to the bets that younger generations are placing on the arrival of the Great Wealth Transfer. Among millennials who expect an inheritance, 69% say it is critical to their long-term financial security, including their ability to buy a home.

But Visa’s model suggests that only $8 trillion of the $36 trillion transfer is likely to become additional consumer spending, while the remaining $28 trillion will be saved or invested.

"The near-term impact on housing demand is probably smaller than the headline numbers suggest," Jones says. The money is "less likely to be needed or used right away, and more likely to trickle out gradually."

That makes a sudden surge of inheritance-funded buyers unlikely. But more importantly, it suggests the transfer may deepen an existing divide. Households that already own property will be better positioned to use inherited wealth, while aspiring buyers may still struggle.

Visa nevertheless projects inherited wealth will produce an average annual 4.6% lift in housing spending through 2045, one of the largest increases among the categories it examined. And that lift may already be visible.

According to the report, 1 in 4 millennial homeowners received parental help with a down payment. Among those buyers, 26% said they could not have purchased their current home when they did without the assistance.

Independent research from the Federal Reserve reinforces the connection. A 2025 working paper estimates that parental transfers account for 13 percentage points, or 27%, of the homeownership rate among young households.

It's a complicated message for buyers already shut out by high prices, mortgage rates, and down payment requirements. Family money can determine whether younger buyers purchase at all—and whether they begin building equity years earlier than those without the same support.

What this means for families

Financial experts emphasize that retirees shouldn't use this information to sacrifice their own security.

"Families should plan around what the retiree needs first and treat any remaining inheritance as the result of a sustainable plan," Sahar says, adding that plan is the key phrase here.

"The greatest threat to an inheritance is often the absence of coordination between retirement spending, taxes, debt, housing, and estate planning," he adds.

For families with enough flexibility, that planning may also include transferring some wealth earlier, when it can have a more immediate effect. A decisive 66% of boomers surveyed wanted to either enjoy their wealth themselves or see their heirs enjoy it while they were alive, compared with 34% who preferred to preserve it for after death.

This is where timing becomes so important. Purchasing your first home by age 30 can result in a $119,000 higher net worth at age 50 than waiting just 10 more years to buy, according to research from Realtor.com.

By that measure, an earlier transfer invested in a home not only allows older generations to see the benefit while they are alive, but it also allows the inheritance to compound into a much larger long-term advantage.

It's a compelling case, but before any of these plans can be set in motion, Mills emphasizes that the first step is understanding what funds are realistically available.

"People definitely overvalue the inheritance, because they see a number in an account and assume that whole account passes on," Mills says. "That’s really where a good financial adviser comes in, to show you the net value you’re actually going to receive, not the value you see on paper."