How to Market to the Hispanic Real Estate Market

The Hispanic population and the number of Hispanic homebuyers is growing yearly in the United States.

Some predict that by 2030, Hispanics will have a 56 percent share of all new homebuyers.

This may or may not be accurate, but what is evident is the growing number of Hispanic homebuyers in the past, and this population is growing.

Now, how do you market effectively to the Hispanic real estate market?

You will find the answer in today’s article, where I first give you more reasons why you might want to consider marketing to Hispanics.

I then analyze the real estate market situation, the media consumption of Hispanics, and Hispanics’ house buying and demand situation.

Then I translate all that into a marketing strategy you could use and test for your real estate business.

Why Consider Marketing to Hispanics?

A good first step is to start looking at the demographic trends happening in the U.S. in this regard.

One of the significant factors in the population growth in the U.S. were Hispanics in the past decade. 

The growth is still there, but as strong as before.

For instance, between 2010 to 2019, the U.S. population increased by 18.9 million. 

The Hispanic share of this growth was 52% (source).

The total number of Hispanics was 60.6 million in 2019 (source).

This represents 18% of the U.S. population. In 2010, this number was still at 16%, with 50.7 million.

The reason for the slower growth now is that the number of births dropped (source), and there is less immigration (from Mexico, (source).

As you might know already, a population increase usually means an increased demand for housing at some point. 

This factor influences macroeconomics and, thus, the demand in a real estate market.

Due to this growth, the homeownership of the Hispanic population has increased. 

According to the State of Hispanic Homeownership Report, 32.4% of U.S. household formation comes from the Hispanic population (source).

I am always a bit wary of future prognostics. Still, some believe Hispanic homeowners’ buying power will rise (source).

It states that the income of Hispanic households grew from $46,000 to $60,000 between 2007 and 2017.

So should this trend continue, the article’s author might be right.

Additionally, according to prognostics cited in an article from bankrate.com, by 2040, nearly 70% of new homebuyers in the U.S. will be Hispanic.

No matter what the future brings, you can’t ignore today’s demographic development and its likely effects on the real estate market demand.

My article on how to market to first-time homebuyers (usually Millennials), I worked out that Millennials are the largest buyer group after baby boomers. 

And an interesting fact in this context is that 20% of the millennial population consists of Hispanics (source).

Most Hispanics (55%) live in California, Texas, and Florida.

Since 2000, there’s been a 10% increase in states such as Utah, Oregon, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Washington, Kansas, Idaho, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Nebraska, and Oklahoma.

Due to these developments, some believe Hispanics will become 56 percent of all new homebuyers by 2030 (source).

So, there are several reasons why you might want to consider marketing to Hispanics or taking this real estate niche at least into consideration:

• A steady increase in the Hispanic population
• Increase in Hispanic household income
• Potential further increases in household income and population, and thus, housing demand in the future

The Real Estate Market Situation and Media Consumption of the Hispanic Target Group

Although the Hispanic population is relatively diverse, some similarities exist regarding home buying.

For instance, housing amounts to 39% of Hispanic financial assets. 

This is an above-average number compared to other ethnic groups in the United States (source).

Unfortunately, this 39% is also why the housing crisis or bubble from 2007 set many Hispanics back regarding affording a down payment and/or having enough credit to finance a house. 

This led many to high-risk and high-cost loans (source).

So, this situation from 2007 set many Hispanics back, and not all have recovered. 

Almost 20% of housing foreclosures in the U.S. happened in Hispanic communities between 2007 and 2015. 

And according to Census information, the Hispanic homeownership rate still needs to recover to the peak of 50.1% in 2007 (source).

So, this situation is something to consider regarding the purchasing process.

Growth Areas of Hispanic Homeowners

To know which geographic areas to focus on for potential marketing campaigns, let’s also look at the growth areas of Hispanic homeowners (source).

Hispanic Media Consumption

To know where and how to reach Hispanics when it comes to real estate marketing campaigns, let’s look at their media consumption:

• In contrast to non-Hispanics, Smartphones, and Tablets are used more. Thus, more time is spent using apps and accessing the Internet on phones (source1, source2).
• Video is generally on the rise (see my article about it here), and Hispanics also spend more time watching videos than non-Hispanics (85 minutes vs. 80 minutes).
• Compared to non-Hispanics, shopping is also done more often on tablets and smartphones (source).
• Compared to non-Hispanics, their attitudes towards advertising are overall more favorable across all channels (source).
• According to a PopSugar Insights 2015 Hypercultural Report, 77% of Hispanics use Facebook, 75% YouTube, and 54% Instagram (source).
• Hispanics in the two age groups of 18-34 and 35+ prefer to spend more time watching TV than engaging with other media.
• Hispanic millennials consume television 18 hours and 28 minutes a week, and the 35+ group spends 33 hours a week (source).

What About the Language?

There is a general rule of thumb you can apply.

The higher the age, the higher the share of Hispanics preferring to communicate in Spanish.

The situation is still a bit complex, but I found a nice table to give you an overview of which language is preferred in which media or marketing channel (source):

The Property Buying and Demand Situation for Hispanics

I also found interesting information about properties that are most in demand and the overall purchase conditions of Hispanics in a National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals from 2019.

According to this report, mainly purchased properties in 2018 had a median property value of $225,000. This is $30,000 less than the overall population.

Hispanics prefer to go for houses below the market median rate.

But, on the other hand, these are generally houses that are more expensive relative to their income compared to other populations.

This also means that they are often more leveraged than other ethnic groups. 

On a side note above, I mentioned that they often get loans at higher costs and risks.

Another fact is that Hispanic homebuyers make lower down payments (data from 2018). 

The median down payment was 3.5%, compared to 10% of the general population. 

The same study shows 71.6% of Hispanic homebuyers purchased homes with less than a 10% down payment in 2018.

Hispanic homebuyers were also the youngest in 2018. 

More than half (69.2%) were 44 or younger. The median age was 40.

Two further essential facts for your potential marketing campaigns are that 60% of Hispanic homebuyers in 2018 were U.S.-born, and self-employed Hispanic homebuyers grew by 16.2% between 2013 and 2018.

And in ending this section, these homebuyers had a median household income of $68,000, which is 32.3% higher than the median income for the total Hispanic households (source).

Real Estate Marketing Ideas and Strategies for Hispanics

Let’s explore potential real estate marketing ideas and strategies for Hispanics.

For that, we summarize the audience research part in a neat table.
After that, we can translate that into a marketing plan or strategy.

So, the above table should give you a good idea of where the marketing strategy might lead. 

I only included data relevant to the typical age group of the respective Hispanic audience segment of home buyers.

This is because the ideal marketing channels depend on the media behavior of the respective age group, which in our case is 40+.

Regarding online advertising campaigns, I will go for pay-per-click advertising focusing on video. 

This can be done by using Google Video Ads on YouTube or Facebook.

Both have advantages and disadvantages. 

With Facebook Ads, you can go more “sniper style” in audience targeting.

With Google Video Ads, you can use the search intent to advertise on relevant, highly-ranked videos.

This route will get you faster results but require you to spend more on ads.

Of course, you could also use content marketing to build a following on YouTube, Instagram, or Facebook.

But as I already mentioned in my article about the best social media platforms for real estate, in this case, I would focus on YouTube. 

Unfortunately, the other social media platforms don’t give you the same organic reach as they did several years ago. 

This approach will take more time until you get the first results. 

Of course, you could make a hybrid approach and do both (pay-per-click advertising and content marketing with video growing a following).

This all depends on the time and money resources you have.

Let’s stay for a moment with the pay-per-click advertising route.

Ideally, your real estate business is already operating in the mentioned geographic areas with most Hispanics and/or where there is a growth in Hispanic homeowners.

You can now target only these areas with Facebook Video Ads or Google Video Ads (on YouTube).

Your ad placements should exclude desktops because they mainly use smartphones and tablets.

You can also test if you get even better results when you target people from the age group of 40+ and a certain annual income. 

In the case of Hispanics, this would be $68,000. 

This targeting option can also be done with Google Ads (limited to the U.S.).

Another targeting option that you can test is narrowing your audience even more.

So you target only self-employed individuals and then select the language option of English and Spanish speaking.

The same language selection can also be made with Google Video Ads.

If you have additional marketing money, you might even consider advertising on local TV stations where you know they have a mainly Hispanic audience.

As a realtor or real estate investor, you only want to focus on and advertise houses in the price range of $225,000.

To sweeten the deal or improve the offer, you can already work with mortgage brokers, where you know that they have access to loans where 2.5% down payments are a possibility. 

Another option here could be to know already if the seller of the respective houses would be up to doing some sort of lease purchase or rent-to-own deal.

As a real estate investor, you can structure such a deal yourself. This is if you specialize in these more creative real estate investing strategies.

Your campaign’s ad copy and copywriting (including ads and landing pages) should consider the bilingual situation.

Although the buyer audience uses mainly English, it may not be a bad idea to mix some Spanish words in your copy, hence Spanglish. 

This might also improve your conversion rates.

This article has been reviewed by our editorial team. It has been approved for publication in accordance with our editorial policy.

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Tobias Schnellbacher

Tobias is an internet entrepreneur with a passion for digital marketing and copywriting, particularly in the real estate sector. He also likes cats and fitness. For nine years, he operated an international online referral real estate agency serving U.S., Canadian, and German sellers and buyers, which resulted in multiple seven-figure property sales.Learn more

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