The number of U.S. households with a net worth of $1 million or more increased only 2% last year, to 9.2 million, according to a report Spectrem Group released Wednesday.
The growth rate was the slowest since 2003, when it was zero, the report said. The rate was 8% in 2006, 11% in 2005, and 21% in 2004. Households with a net worth of $5 million or more also increased 2% last year, to 1.16 million; that rate was the slowest since 2002, when it was zero. Spectrem said the slowdown was "significant," since the rate was 23% in 2006 and 26% in 2005.
"The substantial gains in the number of millionaire and ultra-high-net-worth households we've seen since the end of the dot-com bust has all but ground to halt," George H. Walper Jr., Spectrem's president, said in a press release. "Even as both groups' ranks reached new highs in 2007, growth was practically flat. We had already tracked a steady decline in millionaires' investment optimism since mid-2007 on a variety of concerns, including a slowing economy, rising energy costs, and poor stock market conditions. It now appears those concerns have become a reality for the wealthiest tiers of the U.S. population."
The report was based on a series of surveys conducted last year of over 3,000 households with $500,000 or more of investable assets, as well as a December online survey of over 2,400 millionaire households.
