Americans are holding on to some of their biggest purchases — phones, cars, and homes — longer than they used to. 

And if Americans are suddenly shying away from buying the latest and greatest, that has huge repercussions on the people and companies selling those wares.

As of March, 31% of iPhone buyers had their last iPhone for more than three years, as did 22% of Android buyers, according to data shared by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners. That’s up from 6% for both smartphones a decade ago. The average age of cars on the road has grown to 14 years, which grew from about 11 in 2014, data from S&P Global Mobility shows. And people are living in their homes nearly twice as long — 12 years — as they did in the early 2000s, according to Redfin. 

While I’d like to report that we’re becoming a nation of environmentally conscious savers, that may not be the true motivation for many people. 

“Macro circumstances are forcing frugality on us,” Brett House, a professor of professional practice at Columbia Business School, told me. “People are being very prudent with every penny they spend, and they have to be because costs have gone up so much while incomes have been playing catch-up.”

That’s especially true at the lower end of the income spectrum. “Those folks are going to be much slower to replace technology than they might have been in the past,” he said.

But as they say, money isn’t everything. 

Uncertainty is also at play. Ongoing international wars, climate change, and an upcoming presidential election are casting a pallor of instability across financial decisions.

“If you have anxiety about the future — whether it's the value of a particular item or it's your own financial security — it makes sense to hold on to what you have, rather than risk losing it or risk more insecurity by getting something new,” Chip Colwell, associate research professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado, Denver, said.

Product makers are also contending with the perception that there’s been less innovation lately, as can be seen in a declining number of patents.

Marketing strategies “depend upon convincing consumers that what they have currently is out of fashion or not as great as what the latest thing on the shelf is, and that they need to keep buying,” Colwell said. “I think a lot of consumers, especially in a time of anxiety and uncertainty, are being much more circumspect about buying into — no pun intended — the tales that marketers are telling us.”

There’s also a whole host of reasons specific to each category that are making Americans keep their purchases longer.

Dialing in to longer-lasting phones

A decade ago, many Americans got their phones highly subsidized through their service carriers. In exchange for a free or cheap phone, users would sign two-year contracts and then get a new phone and contract when that time was up.

Since then, carriers have switched to payment plans where customers end up paying for a larger portion of their phones and carriers hold onto more money. Consumers are also now able to buy an unlocked phone directly from Apple or Google or the store down the block on their own terms, on their own timeline.

Phones themselves also last longer now. Have you noticed your phone’s screen is less prone to smashing, even without a screen protector? Battery life has also improved greatly compared to smartphones of yore. Additionally, phone-makers are providing software updates on models for longer — currently for about seven years, compared to three in the past. That means even without hardware changes, older phones are more able to keep up with their newer brethren. 

People also aren’t convinced that new phones are markedly better than their old one — at least, not better enough to warrant such a big purchase. Much of the palpable phone innovation has come in the form of incrementally better cameras, battery life, or features that are cool but ultimately not life-changing.

“Our data indicates most people upgrade a phone these days because of a problem with the previous phone (cracked display, poor battery life, slow processor) rather than attraction to a new feature (new camera, nicer colors),” CIRP partner and cofounder Michael Levin said.

Manufacturers like Apple and Google are hoping that integrating generative AI into their newest smartphones will spur customers to shell out for a new phone more quickly. It’s yet to be seen if that’ll happen.

Driving past the 100,000 mile marker

Cars also last longer than they used to thanks to better engineering, so the need for a new one is less obvious these days.

“Prior to the 2000s, once you hit 100,000 miles, it's like, ‘oh, this car is not going to last much longer,’” Todd Campau, automotive aftermarket practice lead at S&P Global Mobility, told Sherwood. “Now that number is probably 200,000 or 300,000 miles.” That’s been good news for the Autozone and auto garages of the world; it’s been a constraint for carmakers.

The decision to keep a car longer has also been impacted by how expensive new cars have become. Years of high inflation have caused the cost of buying — and maintaining — cars to balloon. Additionally, carmakers have been cramming more technology into new cars than ever, driving up prices even more. For some, that technology is actually a detraction: they liked the older (usually cheaper) features better. Not everyone, for example, wants their smart vehicles tracking them.

“Consumers are not loving that they have to pay for this technology,” Campau said. “They're basically being compelled to pay for technology that they might not want.” 

Then there’s the issue of interest rates. Most people finance their new cars, so higher interest rates drive up their monthly payments significantly. Finally, electric cars are especially feeling the uncertainty of the upcoming presidential election, since federal incentives can greatly impact their cost.

All in all, if your car still runs, it’s becoming more attractive to keep it.

Interest keeps interest in new homes down

The median US home price hit a record high of nearly $440,000 in May, according to Redfin, and the sticker shock alone is keeping many from buying a new home.

Additionally, at around 7%, 30-year fixed mortgage rates are the highest they’ve been in more than 20 years. These rates have put homeowners in an interesting position. People who locked in mortgages at a lower rate are loath to give that up to buy a new house, a situation some have dubbed “golden handcuffs.” Few people want to sell because they’re unable to meet these price rates (indeed, home sales were some of the lowest on record last month). 

Add in boomer trends — 40% of whom are staying in their homes longer than 20 years — and longstanding issues with homebuilding that incentivize constructing higher-end homes, and the situation gets compounded, pricing out first-time homeowners. 

“You've got incredibly low inventory in the market, and no one wants to move because they want to hold on to those emergency-level mortgage rates that they got during the pandemic, which entirely makes sense,” said Columbia University’s House. “The problem then is that we have a deficit of around 2.5 million homes in the US.”

While that might sound like good news for the Home Depots of the world, apparently it’s not. Improvement projects are facing the same headwinds as home purchases.

“As fewer homes are sold, there are fewer associated large projects,” Home Depot CFO Richard McPhail said on a recent earnings call. “The year in which a consumer buys or sells a home is a year in which they typically spend more than in other years.”