Millennials and Gen Zs Don’t Buy Homes—We Hack Them!

Let’s be real. Most of us aren’t buying a $2M vacation home in Aspen anytime soon. We’re still crunching the numbers on a starter home and wondering if our Starbucks coffee and the avocado toast really were the problem. But what if I told you a new trend is changing how we buy homes? It is a disruptive way of real estate. The co-ownership model. That does not just change how we look at the narrative of home ownership, but also means that we invest differently.

It’s called the co-ownership model, and it’s rewriting the rules of who gets to own, how much they own, and how they use it.

That’s where Pacaso comes in—part startup, part real estate rebel. It takes million-dollar homes, turns them into LLCs, and lets you buy just a slice—like 1/8th—of the property. It's not a timeshare. It's actual deeded ownership, just shared with others like you who don’t need a house 365 days a year. You get 6+ weeks, split peak/off-peak fairly, and Pacaso handles everything from scheduling to property management through their app.

From a Millennial/Gen Z lens, here’s why this hits different:

🔸 You get a real stake in the property, not just “rental rights.”

🔸 You split the costs of luxury homeownership without settling for bland rentals.

🔸 You cut out the worst parts—maintenance, tax logistics, and paperwork.

It’s like Airbnb met Robinhood met Zillow—except instead of scrolling dream homes you’ll never afford, you’re actually co-owning one.

This isn’t just a lifestyle flex—it’s also smart economics:

🔸The co-ownership market grew 21% YoY in the U.S.

🔸Pacaso homes have appreciated ~10% since 2021—outpacing the rest of the luxury real estate market

🔸They’ve already expanded to Paris, London, Cabo, and have their sights set on Italy and the Caribbean

Sure, it’s not perfect—there’s some local pushback, and you're locked into one location. But here’s the bigger picture: co-ownership models like Pacaso are cracking open a door that’s been shut to an entire generation.

This model flips that: you own what you can actually use, share the burden, and get a foothold in an asset class that’s otherwise off-limits.

While Pacaso may be stealing the spotlight, several other companies are already making waves in fractional and shared homeownership, each with its own unique spin worth knowing about.

1. Plum CoOwnership

  • A platform that helps groups buy and share vacation homes with real equity. Starting with 3–10 owners, Plum handles the legal setup, scheduling, and property management through its app. Properties range from coastal escapes in the Outer Banks and Nantucket to ski chalets in Montana and luxury retreats in Southern California. Owners enjoy flexible use, potential appreciation, and the ability to resell their share—without the hassle of full-time ownership.

2. Kocomo

  • A lot like Pacaso, luxury vacation home co-ownership with real equity. Buy 1/8–1/4 of a high-end property through an LLC, enjoy several weeks per year, and share in any appreciation when you sell your stake. Kocomo manages everything—maintenance, scheduling, and bills—so you get the perks of a second home without the year-round burden. In the U.S., you’ll find listings like Newport Beach, Miami, and St. George, Utah. It also offers listings in Europe (e.g., Spain, Italy, England, Croatia), Asia, Africa, Australia & Pacific regions

3. Arrived Homes

  • Arrived Homes turns rental homes and vacation rentals into SEC-qualified real estate investments that anyone can buy into. Shares start around $100, and investors earn passive income from rent, plus potential appreciation when the property sells.

4. Lofty.ai

  • Lofty.ai sells fractional ownership of tokenized rental properties, meaning your ownership stake exists on the blockchain. You can buy in for as little as $50 per property. Properties are split into digital tokens (each representing a slice of ownership). Rent is distributed daily to your account in cryptocurrency (USDC), and you can resell your tokens anytime on Lofty’s secondary market.

5. Mogul Club

  • Mogul Club enables ordinary investors to buy into single-family rental properties with as little as $250. It’s built by former Goldman Sachs real estate professionals, offers an average annual return around 18.8%, and handles everything from rental income to property management, with monthly payouts and real-time property valuations via its dashboard

6. Unison Home Ownership Investors

  • A different twist—They invest alongside you, contributing part of your down payment (usually 5–15%). You make no monthly payments to them. Instead, when you sell (or after a set period, usually 30 years), they take an agreed share of your home’s change in value — typically ~35% of the gain (or loss). So, instead of acting like a lender, Unison is acting like a co-investor in your home. It’s more like having a silent equity partner who gets paid when you cash out, rather than a bank collecting interest every month.

7. CoBuy (with Co-ownerOS™)

  • A software platform (not a property marketplace) that helps co‑buyers plan, define ownership structure, draft agreements, manage finances, and even exit strategies—all with blockchain-secured documents. It’s more of an enabler tool—software that helps people who already have a co-buying group manage the process and paperwork.

Bottom line: we may not be able to afford homes the old way—but co-ownership could be how we start building real estate wealth on our own terms.

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