The process of buying a home is so traumatic that it's making half of Americans cry, survey finds

• Half of Americans are crying as a result of attempts to buy a home, Zillow survey finds.
• Almost two-thirds of Gen Z and 61% of Millennial buyers have cried during the process.

Buying a home has become so challenging that half of Americans have reported crying at least once while going through the process, according to a new survey published by real-estate marketplace company Zillow.

The report found that 65% of Gen Z buyers and 61% of Millennials reported crying while trying to buy a home. Meanwhile, Latinx buyers were far more likely to cry than black and white homebuyers.

"Buying a home is not like buying any other asset; it's deeply personal and it's emotional," Zillow home trends expert Amanda Pendleton said in a statement. "When you make an offer on a home, you have likely envisioned your life there. If you lose out on that home to a stronger offer, it can feel like losing a future you have already started planning."

The trends reflect an increasingly competitive market that continues to price out millions of homebuyers in the US, particularly millennials and Gen Z buyers more reliant on finance to fund a home against a rising tide of all-cash and investment purchases, regarded as more attractive to buyers.

In its 2021 Consumer Trends Housing Report, Zillow found 60% of homeowners had at least two offers on their homes, while the group found nearly half of all homes sold in April went for below asking price.

The market is being driven by increasingly competitive conditions that also include historically low levels of supply, though data from Realtor.com suggests inventories rose last month for the first time since June 2019.

The spectre of a recession is expected to throw cold water on rising prices, and is even forcing some luxury home buyers to change their behavior, but continued shortages and an expectation that prices will remain stable mean buying a home is unlikely to get easier.