Andy Kiersz

1 week ago | businessinsider.com | Andy Kiersz |Noah Sheidlower |Henry Blodget

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Donald Kimmel, 78, who retired from his role as a bone biologist 16 years ago but continues consulting and peer reviewing articles. Kimmel, who lives in The Villages, Florida, said he's stayed healthy and active and has enjoyed his retirement years, even though he doesn't often get to the beach. His words have been edited for length and clarity. Socially and career-wise, I have no major regrets.

1 week ago | businessinsider.com | Andy Kiersz |Eliza Relman |Henry Blodget

Proponents of boosting the declining US birth rate are targeting Americans' biggest expense: housing. They say what parents and would-be parents need are cheaper homes that would give their families the room and financial security to grow. A recent report by the Institute for Family Studies, a conservative think tank that pushes for policies to increase the birth rate, concluded that housing costs were the single biggest factor stopping Americans from having as many kids as they want.

1 week ago | businessinsider.com | Andy Kiersz |Eliza Relman |Henry Blodget

Justin Ghio and his fiancé wanted to make the plunge into homeownership when interest rates plummeted at the height of the pandemic in 2020. They made offers on four houses in San Diego, but they were outbid on all of them. Soon enough, home prices and mortgage rates were soaring amid a buying frenzy, and they felt they'd missed their opportunity to buy. "I'd always hoped to own a home," Ghio said.

1 week ago | businessinsider.com | Andy Kiersz |Noah Sheidlower |Henry Blodget

Sitting at her sewing machine, Bernita Clark, 82, guides a piece of blue fabric as the needle bobs up and down. To her side sit scissors, measuring tape, thread, and a skull. It's for a costume she's designing for a 12-foot-tall skeleton. The labor is painstaking, attaching the fabric such that the soon-to-be well-clad lawn fixture becomes the talk of the town. But, she said, the work has been one of the most fulfilling parts of retirement.

2 weeks ago | businessinsider.com | Andy Kiersz |Eliza Relman |Madison Hoff |Henry Blodget

Gen Zers and millennials are postponing buying their first home, a growing number of older people are renting, and tenants are staying in their rentals for longer. This adds up to a record-high number of renters and an increasing share of those renters in older generations. "Renting today isn't just for young adults starting out," said Nadia Evangelou, a senior economist for the National Association of Realtors. "It's actually a much more mixed picture.