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A Pew Research survey from February 2026 found that 72% of Americans have a negative view of the economy and nearly 40% believe conditions will be worse a year from now.

Meanwhile, the S&P 500 is hovering near all-time highs, unemployment is low, corporate earnings are solid and mortgage rates are finally dipping below 6% for the first time in years.

What’s the fear about?

Either 72% of the population is seeing something the market isn’t… or sentiment has completely disconnected from reality. I think it’s mostly the latter. And that disconnect creates both risk and opportunity for investors who know how to read it.

I get it, the past few years have been rough.

Inflation spiked to levels most people hadn’t experienced since the 1980s. Groceries, insurance, housing… everything felt more expensive. Even though inflation has cooled, the prices didn’t really come back down. They just stopped rising as fast. People feel poorer even if the official numbers say otherwise.

Interest rates also shot up. Anyone who needed to buy a home, finance a car, or carry a credit card balance got squeezed. The 3% mortgage era ended abruptly and millions of people who thought they’d move or refinance got stuck.

The headlines haven’t helped either. Recession warnings, bank failures and layoffs at major tech companies. AI threatening to replace jobs and political instability. Every week brings a new reason to feel anxious about the future.

So when 72% of people say the economy feels bad, I honestly believe them. It does feel bad for a lot of people. The lived experience doesn’t match the macro data.

But the thing is, feelings and investment returns don’t always move together. In fact, they often move in opposite directions.

When everyone is optimistic, prices tend to stretch. Because when everyone is pessimistic, prices tend to be compressed. That’s just how markets work.

Think about March 2009. The financial system had nearly collapsed, unemployment was spiking and headlines were apocalyptic. Public sentiment was in the gutter.

But it was also the BEST buying opportunity in a generation. The S&P 500 was about to begin a decade-long bull run that would return over 400%!

Or think about late 2021. Everyone was euphoric when crypto was mooning, SPACs were printing money and people were quitting their jobs to day-trade meme stocks. This time, sentiment was through the roof!

But what followed was one of the worst years for a traditional 60/40 portfolio in decades. Stocks fell, bonds fell and crypto crashed. The people who bought at peak optimism got crushed.

After some time, you start to notice a pattern…

Now. I’m not saying sentiment is a perfect contrarian indicator. But extreme pessimism (72% negative) is historically more associated with opportunity than with danger. 

When people feel bad about the economy, they don’t invest. They instead choose to sit on cash. They wait for things to “settle down” before making decisions and tell themselves they’ll get in once things look clearer.

But things almost never look clear at the bottom. Clarity comes after the recovery has already started. By the time everyone agrees the economy is fine, the best opportunities have already passed.

I’ve talked to dozens of people over the years who’ve been “about to invest” for five or ten years running. They’re always waiting for the right moment. The right moment never arrives because they’re waiting for certainty… and certainty doesn’t exist in investing.

Meanwhile, time continues to pass… compound returns they could have earned are lost forever. Every year you sit on the sidelines is a year of returns you never get back.

The flip side is that widespread negativity can work in your favor if you’re positioned to act.

When most people are scared, competition decreases. In real estate, fewer buyers means less bidding pressure. Sellers become more motivated and all of a sudden, deals that wouldn’t have been possible two years ago… start appearing.

We’re seeing this right now in commercial real estate. Operators who borrowed at 3% and can’t refinance at 7% are selling at discounts. The headlines call it “distress” but for buyers with capital, it’s an opportunity.

The same dynamic plays out in other markets. When sentiment is low, assets get mispriced. Patient investors who can look past the headlines and focus on fundamentals tend to do well in these environments.

This doesn’t mean you should be reckless. Pessimism exists for reasons and some of those reasons are valid. The economy might get worse before it gets better. A correction could absolutely happen.

But if you’re sitting on cash indefinitely because you’re waiting for everyone to feel good about the economy, you’re going to be waiting a long time. And you’ll probably miss the recovery when it comes.

Buyers who purchase their first home by age 30 have a 22.5% higher net worth by age 50 compared with those who wait until their 40s — a difference averaging about $119,000, according to Realtor.com data.

Yet for younger buyers, entering the housing market has become far more difficult. The median age of a first-time homebuyer has climbed from 30 in 1990 to 40 in 2025 as home prices have outpaced income growth, the report said. Although there is industry debate about whether 40 years old is the true median age of first-time homebuyers, as many think it is lower.

That shift is reshaping how agents communicate the value of homeownership — particularly when trying to reach younger consumers navigating affordability concerns and skepticism about the housing market.

Towanna Peterson-Jackson, co-team lead at Detroit-based Team Peterson Jackson Brokered by eXp Realty, said her team focuses on reinforcing the idea that younger buyers can still enter the market — even amid rising hurdles.

“We’ve always had affordability at the forefront of our marketing because of the area that we service primarily, which is metro Detroit,” she told HousingWire. “It’s more of an urban epicenter. So when we advertise, when we market, when we talk to our consumers, we always want to lead with the value of, ‘You can do it and you can find the help to do it.’”

Programs that reduce the upfront barrier to entry — such as FHA loans, VA loans and down payment assistance — often become central to that message, Peterson-Jackson added.

Agents also increasingly emphasize the financial cost of delaying homeownership cited by Realtor.com.

“When you’re waiting, you do lose wealth essentially because that’s equity that you’re not getting,” said Team Peterson Jackson co-team lead LaShawn Peterson-Jackson. “If you wait until you’re 40, you’re losing equity, and you’re losing time, because now you’re 40 and most homes take 30 years to pay off, so you’ll be 70 if you decide to pay it off.”

Positioning homeownership as one piece of wealth building

Marketing to younger generations often requires acknowledging that many consumers see multiple pathways to financial success — from entrepreneurship to investing to digital careers, the team leaders added.

Towanna said her team positions homeownership as one component of a broader financial strategy.

“The home you’re going to use is just one of the things that are going to help you build wealth in life,” she said. “I stick to that because, with the younger generation, there are so many other ways to do it. We talk about being an influencer. You can get money by saving and looking into an insurance option. We just try to package it as, ‘This is just one piece of the puzzle.’”

Stability is another part of the message, said LaShawn.

“During those months when you’re stable and you’re not having to worry about housing, you can concentrate on other ways to build wealth,” she said. “I look back on my own journey and how stability was there for me and my children. I could just worry about my career and getting them all the things that they need.

“I wasn’t constantly worried about where we were going to live or if the landlord was going to renew my lease, or if my lease was going to go up.”

Education and community outreach

Agents are also leaning more heavily on education and community outreach to reach potential first-time buyers — particularly in communities where homeownership has historically been less common.

The generational wealth report found that housing wealth often carries across generations. Children raised in homeowner households are 18.4 percentage points more likely to become homeowners themselves by age 35.

But that advantage is unevenly distributed.

In 2025, the homeownership rate stood at 75.1% for white households compared with 44.2% for Black households and 48.7% for Hispanic households.

LaShawn said community workshops are one way her firm helps close those gaps.

“We sold a house to a lady a few years ago and her mom rented the same house since 1984,” she said. “She was the first person in her family of memory to own a home, and we were able to reach her through a homebuying workshop.

“We do these workshops all over the city at all times, letting people know how to purchase a home. We’re in churches. We’re in community centers. We have them here in our office. Whether two people show up or 200, we want to give them the best guidance.”

Education also extends to digital platforms, where younger buyers increasingly search for housing information.

“We’re on social media. We talk about it constantly on social media, and we have trained our team of agents to do the same thing and deliver the same message.”

Changing perceptions, addressing fears

Beyond affordability challenges, agents say younger buyers often carry concerns shaped by modern housing and economic crises.

“We’re also often dealing with the children of the (2008) crash, LaShawn said. “It was very prevalent in our area. For people whose families lost their home, they’re coming of age, and a lot of them are afraid (to buy a home) because they watched their parents lose their home.”

Towanna said education remains the most effective way to overcome those fears.

Her team also works to connect buyers with reputable lenders and credit counseling resources — helping them prepare financially before entering the market.

“It’s about working with credit repair individuals who are not there to just take your money, like, ‘Send me $1,000 and I’ll increase your credit score.’ Don’t do that,” she said. “You want to work with someone who’s going to help educate you on how to have good credit, how to have good consumer credit and what that looks like as the years progress.”

Ultimately, agents say the earlier younger consumers begin learning about homeownership, the more likely they are to see it as achievable.

“LaShawn and I have one of the few teams that go to schools, the elementary schools, to explain about buying a home,” said Towanna. “People say, ‘Why would you talk to a third grader about purchasing a home?’ It’s because people remember those individuals that came to their school when they were in the third and fourth grade and the message that they left them with.”