Goldman Sachs says equities have surpassed real estate as top US wealth driver for first time since WWII

For roughly 80 years, the answer to “what makes Americans rich” was boringly consistent: real estate. That era, according to Goldman Sachs, is officially over.

Equities have overtaken real estate as the primary driver of US household wealth for the first time since World War II. The finding, drawn from Goldman’s latest research and echoed in its 2025 Family Office Investment Insights Report, marks a structural turning point in how wealth is built and concentrated across income levels in America.

The numbers behind the shift

Goldman’s family office data shows public equity allocations climbing to 31% in 2025, up from 28% in 2023. That’s a meaningful jump in just two years, reflecting a decisive tilt toward liquid, growth-oriented assets among the wealthiest households and institutional family offices.

Private real estate and infrastructure allocations, by contrast, sit at just 11% in 2025. That figure edged up only slightly from prior years, a far cry from the aggressive property accumulation that defined earlier decades of American wealth building.

Real estate still matters enormously for middle-income households, where a home often represents the single largest asset. But at higher net worth tiers, equities have pulled decisively ahead.

Why this happened now

Goldman’s 2025-2026 outlook specifically highlights AI-related growth opportunities as a key theme driving equity market returns. The bank also flags increased dispersion within equity markets, meaning stock-picking skill matters more than it did when everything just went up together.

On the real estate side, the Federal Reserve’s aggressive rate hiking cycle that began in 2022 made mortgages expensive and transaction volumes sluggish. Goldman’s outlook suggests real estate could rebound if interest rates come down.

What this means for crypto and risk assets

Goldman’s report doesn’t explicitly address cryptocurrency allocations. But the broader trend it describes — capital migrating from illiquid, physical assets toward liquid, growth-focused instruments — is directionally favorable for digital assets.

The wealth composition shift also matters for market structure. When household wealth is concentrated in equities, those households become more sensitive to market drawdowns. A sharp correction in stocks now hits aggregate net worth harder than it would have a decade ago, when real estate provided a larger ballast.

Goldman’s projection of continued equity market dispersion in 2025-2026 suggests active management and thematic bets, particularly around AI, will define winners and losers.

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