If you haven’t already read this, Lisa Rochon’s article in The Globe is really worth the click:
Why the cities of the future belong to the millennial generation

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Here’s the national exclusive on why millennial urbanites are attracted to beauty and back-lane urban grit, not the museums and wind-swept modernist plazas their baby boomer parents helped to build. …
Across Canada, there are 10-million millennials. As more of them move out of their family homes and become income earners over the next decade, their influence will be felt, especially as second-generation immigrants employ what Michael Adams calls “code-switching skills.” …
Because the millennials are fiercely independent, they’ll live alone and wait rather than start up a family the way their parents did when they were in their 20s. Living in smaller spaces is fine by them, especially if it’s designed in an interesting way and uses materials that go easy on the environment.  … Cities with bike lanes and densely configured, well-designed housing will attract young urbanites for the long-term. …
More than any other urban group, millennials living in big-city downtowns are able to absorb complexity in life. They’re more sexually permissive. They’re believers in cultural fusion and equality of the sexes. It’s only in the interest of city builders to welcome them, eyes wide open.

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Kent Lundberg submits this for additional perspective:

Boomers to blame for rising urban home prices

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Home prices in urban areas did not fall as hard as those in the suburbs, according to John McLain of the Urban Land Institute, and they are recovering far faster. Boomers, whose retirement savings took a hit during the recession, are now more leery of home values and less willing to risk losing again.
“They want to buy something that’s secure, and it’s been pretty well demonstrated that suburban housing is not as secure an asset as anyone thought it was or that it used to be,” McClain said.
Boomers are also looking for walkability, proximity to public transit and diversity. They also want to be closer to their children, who generally head to cities right after college. This is a big change from their parents, who often headed to warmer areas to retire. …
“The idea of living out in the suburbs, just with older people, has really disappeared,” said Urban Land Institute’s McClain.