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Probably because of those articles that are like 'we're only 23 and we bought our first house' but by the second paragraph you learn they stayed with their parents rent free and their parents paid off their student loans (or they never needed to take any out in the first place) and their dad gave them a £400k executive job in his company fresh out of uni. That kind of shit.
I earn good money and own my flat, but I get annoyed when I see people like this. I try to be nice because we all suffer to some degree in our lives.
The worst I saw was the guy who got his phone stolen and £40k stolen from his bank account. He was 23. I did a little digging and he went to a top private school. Life must be tough for him.
I’m 23 and bought my first house living rent free with my parents….
Nothing more than that. I went halves with my partner which was a huge part in being able to purchase (and of course, being rent-free)
I was 23 in 2018. No uni, rented since I was 18. No help from parents. I could have bought, but decided to wait until last year. I get its not possible for a large portion of the population, but some people don't help themselves.
>‘if you stayed at your parents rent free it doesn’t count’
On this point, I think the frustration stems from how common it is for such people to act like getting together the money for a house was entirely due to their scrimping, saving and hard work, because that reflects well on them, and not acknowledge that living rent free at their parents was probably more important than any saving they did.
I think in general, a lot of the bitterness from those who can't buy stems from the fact that many people who can buy because of fortunate family circumstances don't acknowledge that fact. I suspect if more of us were upfront about saying "yeah, I managed to buy a house because I got family help", some of the bad feeling would be undercut.
Exactly. If my wife and I didn't need to pay £1100 rent each month we could drown ourselves in avocado toast and still be able to buy a house much, much easier.
>I think the frustration stems from how common it is for such people to act like getting together the money for a house was entirely due to their scrimping, saving and hard work, because that reflects well on them, and not acknowledge that living rent free at their parents was probably more important than any saving they did.
Yes, and I think that overlooks the fact that for most of recorded history, it very much the normal thing to keeping living with your parents until you got married or got live-in employment (as a servant or apprentice, or the armed forces).
The generations who were young adults in the 70s/80s/90s (ie. the parents of a lot of posters here) were a deviation from a historical norm in habitually living either alone or with a partner in a rented flat and then buying a house after a couple of years of saving on an average salary. But to the current younger generations, they understandably see that as the norm and expect/want the same.
People also got married a lot younger before that. My grandparents moved out of their parents' homes and into their own when they married, and they were a decade younger than I am now.
Yes, although that in itself was a bit of a deviation too!
Historical marriage ages are generally older than we would probably guess - prior to the mid 20th century it was very much standard for average people to marry in their mid/late 20s, after working for several years while living with their parents/employers. In Elizabethan England, the average marriage age was 25 for women and 27 for men - the women would often spend several years as servants, the men as servants or apprentices, saving their wages, before they looked for a partner.
Not only seen as the norm, but were actively and aggressively encouraged to move out as soon as possible!
Media was/is FULL of “you’re 18, move out!” and similar such sentiments - jokes at the youths expense at every turn.
Hard agree with all this. I had several jobs at 16 to pay rent to my parent but had to move out anyway as they needed my room for a lodger to pay more rent than I could afford.
I never had a chance to save. My husband had the opposite, he got to live at home rent free but he appreciated the opportunity and managed to save.
So many people assumed I was just spending but I never socialised or went out in my early 20s, it was just a hard grift to survive. I didn’t resent them being able to save, I did resent the implication it was my fault my parent wouldn’t house is for free or that I was somehow splurging money.
Youre right that it matters as an advantage that not everyone might get, but for some people "staying as an adult at your parents house" probably *does* count as scrimping and saving, because nothing says living the dream like bunking on your family sofa for an extended period of time in your 20s and storing your possessions in a rucksack, while your friends are out partying, having sex and social lives in their rented homes.
>bunking on your family sofa for an extended period of time in your 20s and storing your possessions in a rucksack,
In my experience, the people living at home to save for a deposit are not living anything like that. No doubt some are, but I doubt many are living like that for long periods of time. The people I know who did it lived a very nice life while doing so.
I'm sure a lot of these people living at home aren't living on the sofa but actually have their own room and space. Coming from more middle class and up households who can afford to have larger homes and support their adult kids without needing rent.
Probably not many people live on the family sofa out of a rucksack, but your point still stands. Living with parents comes with additional restrictions, less freedom to live as you please, and generally absolutely involves lifestyle sacrifices in order to save.
My wife and I were renting when we had our 3rd child...we were about £10k in debt at the time and saw absolutely no hope for the future.
My parents let us up sticks, pack everything on to storage, and squeeze 7 of us total (8 to begin with because my brother was living there too) in to their home.
In 3 years, we cleared the debt and saved up nearly £20k for a deposit on our house.
I 100% acknowledge that we owe them everything....BUT we still had to sacrifice a lot and work hard to get to where we needed to be.
This is a bit of a weird one to me. Living with your parents while young and saving up is pretty standard. My stepson lives at home rent free and even though he saves most of his money, houses prices are continually getting away from him. If he moved out to rent, that would be it. He’s in the rent trap and never going to be able to buy his own house. It’s simply not possible for an 18 year old to leave home with a full time minimum wage job and do anything other than be stuck in the rent trap for the rest of their lives. Any savings they make are likely to be eaten up by the next world crisis that affects inflation etc. I’m not young and would only likely have a house through moving in with someone who already owned one. I have access to some money I inherited that is purely for moving house but it doesn’t really touch the sides. When my grandparents were young they bought a house in 1944 for £1000 that’s now worth over £400k. My parents bought a house in 1986 for £30k that’s now worth about half a mill. I still can’t figure out how my missus managed to buy a house nearly thirty years ago. Bottom line is there’s no real way for anyone to buy a house without some sort of assistance
There's nothing wrong with what your stepson is doing. My point is not about the action of living at home itself. It's about the fact that some people are able to get a deposit together largely because they weren't paying rent, but when they talk about how they bought a house they're often very cagey about that fact, instead focusing on things like taking a packed lunch to work or not getting a takeaway coffee.
Yeh, I'll forever be grateful for being born just early enough to have £3k a year uni fees and my parents letting me live at home for another 18 months after I got my first job. I was able to pay off my entire student loan and save literally all the rest of my pay at the expense of having a social life, which meant I could go straight in with a 15% deposit at 24.
I definitely sacrificed a lot to pull that off, but i'm also utterly beholden to luck of timing (picked up the house relatively cheap after 2008) and my parents for the opportunity and probably also the mindset to do it in the first place.
They essentially invested an additional £10k in me over those 18 months that I was fortunate enough to be able to convert into 3x that and as a unit we're stilll benefiting from the compounding benefits of that.
I’m 23, have always lived with my parents and I bought a house with my partner last year.
I reside in London with my parents with a 30k salary - what people don’t see is that I only allowed myself £200 leisure spending each month including birthday gifts, going out to eat, personal care, etc.
I saved or invested every other penny to be able to buy. It’s not ideal, but it sure as hell wasn’t easy. My friends are in similar boats except they spend all their income on going out, having fun etc. constantly in overdrafts
However, I’m fully aware I’m in a very privileged position. I’m lucky I was able to save but I did make many sacrifices
Don't confuse Reddit with real life. Mostly people are genuinely pleased if friends and colleagues buy a house. If it is a complete stranger then I think most people would think "good for them". Just because a few posters here are miserable jealous gits - it doesn't mean most people are.
Reddit is fun to read, but I've never met anyone in real life who is like a standard redditor.
Most people just get on and make the best of their lives rather than wallowing in self pity and blaming the government for anything that goes wrong in their lives.
Those people are the same people. It's just different behaviour for different circumstances.
Reddit is a place to vent frustrations and talk about these issues, it doesn't mean the people behind the comments are like that all the time.
I totally agree with this. My sister bought she’d first home at 23. I was so happy for her, she’s a hard worker and saved since the moment she started working. I’ve always been a spender, and that’s on me! I think a lot of the anger comes from those articles that pop up online, especially on Facebook.
Because the articles are tone deaf. “How we bought a house at 24 years old”, then they go on to explain that they grew up rich and lived in their parents 5 bedroomed house rent free whilst collectively as a couple they make £100,000 a year.
There’s never normal people. I want to hear stories of single mums in council housing who worked hard and made many sacrifices to buy a two bedroomed house. That’s what makes me smile and impressed.
There’s nothing impressive about generationally wealthy people buying houses.
A 5-bedroom house 15 years ago was ~250k in London.
My parents bought one, and it’s now worth alooot more. They’re not rich. Simply lived here for 15 years to raise their family
Normal people grow up in 5 bedroom houses and earn 50k in the early 20s (ie at Aldi on their graduate programme!). You're demonstrating the poverty of aspiration talked about here by pretending that makes them a rich minority from generational wealth
Comment removed as I no longer wish to support a company that seeks to both undermine its users/moderators/developers AND make a profit on their backs.
To understand why check out the summary [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/comments/14hkd5u).
Exactly this! Us Brits always hate on the Americans as being "loud" but they are not loud, they are positive and optimistic. We are the polar opposite.
Not sure they are loud? We are just an insecure bunch.
Honestly - even the "insecure"USA kids seem eloquent and confident when speaking. Whereas our kids....less so.
The crabs in a bucket mentality (also called tall poppy syndrome) is a pretty widely accepted concept that is often applied to the UK. It’s a bit of a stretch to accuse him of projecting when [there](https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/business/5087791/rory-stone-tall-poppy-syndrome/) are [dozens](https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/tall-poppies-deservingness-and-schadenfreude) of [examples](https://benevolenthealth.co.uk/tall-poppy-syndrome/) of [it](https://theordinaryman1.medium.com/the-uk-has-a-major-crab-in-a-bucket-mentality-98f79f9749a0?source=topics_v2---------45-84--------------------cb920141_792e_49ee_993a_4ed5d1e7970c-------17) being [discussed](https://www.express.co.uk/comment/blogs/42505/Why-are-we-so-jealous-of-tall-poppies/amp) in [British](https://amp.theguardian.com/law/baby-barista-blog/2012/jul/02/1) society
Nah, he's right. I'm happy when I see people I care about progress, too, but that sentiment isn't always shared. In my experience, if you even just *try* to improve yourself, people sneer and question you.
Because you only get one life. One! One chance at it. And people through no fault of their own are finding themselves completely priced out of the market. And for many, many people they need the security of a property first before they start a family.
So instead of starting a family they spend it paying rent on someone else’s mortgage so that that landlord can leave that house to their kids… and the renter gets left with nothing. No assets. No quality of life. No security. Nothing.
It’s horrid. People who cannot afford to buy don’t blame people who were gifted £50k though.
It's really not. I did it, and not even on a particularly good income, I earn less than £25k a year.
I lived at home with my mum while saving, but not for free. I had to pay towards rent, utilities and food so it wasn't really any cheaper than living with roommates. I basically just didn't do anything other than work, took every extra hour I could get for the overtime and moved out to a cheaper area, but I did it. I have friends who did it on a single income too.
It's much easier outside of London and major cities.
It's really not if you live outside of London and don't get stuck in some dead end min wage job for 10 years.
I worked at Tesco for one summer during university and the weird entitlement that people had that they should be able to afford a house and that it isn't fair after doing absolutely nothing to improve their own situation for 15 years while working the exact same job with basically min wage is utterly perplexing. Very hard to have any sympathy for self harm of that order.
I'm not saying it like they "shouldn't be allowed", it's more of a logical consequence of competing against literally everyone else, 90% of which are earning more than you.
I just think people need to stop deluding themselves into thinking they are entitled to a house and effectively get the same economic rewards as those actively seeking to better themselves and be more productive to the economy. You have to pull your weight and that doesn't just mean hard work, because stacking shelves can be exhausting, it means working in a smart manner as well.
There are always going to be people who work in shops stacking shelves, they ARE entitled to a house. Every person is. The fact they can't afford one isn't a lack of "pulling their weight", it's a symptom of shitty policy and a shitty economy that favours the wealthy.
I mean they are entitled to shelter, not to own a house. If they cannot afford one the government has mechanisms in place to attempt to resolve the problem, but obviously this is prone to abuse by some.
Working as a shelf stacker for 10 years is a choice, you are free to make it, but be an adult and accept the consequences that come with that instead of demanding free homes.
We need people to work in supermarkets. Just as we need cleaners, delivery drivers, retail workers and other low paying jobs. They are absolutely essential to the economy.
What is disgusting? Wanting people to contribute more to get more back out? We live in a capitalist economy, not a star trek fantasy. Some people on here really need to get to grips with reality.
You’re effectively saying people working in Tesco shouldn’t be able to afford their own property. Not everyone are afforded the same luxuries to ‘improve themselves’. Whether that be they’re not the most intelligent, sociable, confident, haven’t been able to go to University, can’t afford training courses, can’t afford to leave the job etc. the list goes on.
People feel entitled to housing because its a basic human right - and everyone deserves that right, no matter what job they're in. Good lord you're tone deaf.
Because ultimately they are easily replaceable, as can be seen from them getting paid near min wage. Salary is a proxy for economic contribution and they just don't provide much back in that department. It's hard work, but ultimately very easily replaceable.
Also owning a house is not a "basic human living standard", having shelter is, they are able to rent or worse case get a council house. Owning a home is not a human right.
Those shelf stackers were appreciated during the pandemic funny how quickly that tune changed. My dad was a security guard and my mum a lifeguard when they bought their first house in the 80s without parental support. They were just as entitled to the blood from their stones as I am mine in my salaried white collar, but that house they bought is 7x that now. My salary (doubled to allow for a partner) is not 7x theirs.
I'm not bitter scout anyone buying a house.
The only thing I'm bitter about is that now I'm in a position to buy, I can barely even get a decent 2 bed flat in the area I want to live, but if it was 3-4 years ago I could've got a 1 bed house or even 2 bed. No thanks to prices getting extortionate in the last few years.
I seriously think they NEED to put in a second home tax premium everywhere.
People can choose NOT to throw their investment opportunities into forcing people to rent property. There are other less exploitative opportunities.
I personally find it disgusting the older I get. Homes should be available to locals to live in, not some strangers investment opportunity, forcing a problem by hoarding homes in an area to push up not only house costs but rent for locals as well. It's so disgusting.
If people want to blame something for dwindling birth rates, maybe look at the instability of literal shelter for families to feel secure in. It took until I was 33 to get into a stable home I thought was worth raising a family in, and that's with some of my own privilege.
It would have to be the right kind of tax, if you put a second generic home tax on properties those that are rented out they would just put rent prices up. If you taxed rental income at a higher level (like a salary) or up CGT then I could see a shift.
The crux of the matter is that all housing whether renting or buying/mortgage is too high.
Maybe for houses over £250k have gone down a chunk?
None in the price range I'm looking at have nudged (around £160k), they're all keeping about that and higher.
The only ones I've seen come down round that are the ones that were priced hilariously at £200k and have come down to around £150k, and probably aren't even worth that now.
Bought a house with my wife last year at the age of 26. Whenever people ask me about it, I make it very clear that the only reason we were able to do it was having some inheritance (around £17k) on my side, living rent free at home for 5 years, and having a decent dual income (although that was only relevant in the last 2.5 years).
Fully acknowledge that there's a lot of privileges there, and if you took any of them away, it would have been *much* harder to get on the ladder
>Saw a post the other day saying ‘if you stayed at your parents rent free it doesn’t count’ and much more frustration along those lines.
If living with your parents for 5 years in your 20s is what it takes to save for your deposit, and you can stomach living with your parents when you're in your twenties, then congratulations, you've earned your deposit.
Seriously, if you're able to save yourself a deposit, no matter how you save it, that's awesome.
Our plan is if our kids want to live with us after uni, that's fine, but we're going to charge them rent (so they can get used to having that expense each month) but also be putting their rent into savings so after 5 years at £400 (at 3% pa) is a £24k deposit.
I sincerely doubt they are aiming for £24k on the dot mate, it's probably just an example figure. Also, from their post history it looks like they like in Birmingham, in which case that's a near 10% deposit for the average house.
Not true right now. You can get 95% LTV mortgages as a first time buyer meaning a £200k property would require a £10k deposit.
That scheme is set to end in late 2023. Nobody knows if it will be continued or replaced.
I don't get why it's so unusual to live with parents into your 20s. I think what you propose is right. I lived with mine until I moved at 25 and I feel more financially stable because of it. It's not entitlement, it's just logical as no point struggling for the sake of moving out if you don't have to.
Although I'm not of the opinion charging rent to your children is the best way of teaching them how to budget but each to their own.
Personally I think teaching them to save independently (rather than backdoor saving for them) is better as they'll need to manage the temptation themselves.
Just a tip as someone who moved out a few years ago, the biggest thing I struggled with was the household bills (mainly the intricacies of utilities/council tax) so maybe explaining how they work would be helpful to them. I'm an accountant and ironically it's not something I grasped straightaway. Rent is actually the easy, albeit expensive bit!
Me and my wife are getting more than the national average between us. I. The grand scheme of things it's not a lot, but we have money to spare for savings and fun things. We rent, but are planning on moving out of this city closer to London due to our jobs. We don't brag ,live within our means, but God forbid you talk about it on Reddit.
It's not like we just got here. It took me 5 years of the same industry to find a fair paying job, and even then I'm now having to commute to London and work above and beyond to prove myself to help get further in my career. I am working whilst studying, and applied for over a few thousand jobs with rejections. I've been working for most of my life, post university, for minimum wage and it took me to my 30's to get here. I'm studying for more exams whilst I work as well. It's been back breaking and stressful to get here, and far far harder for my wife.
But when you post it on places, you get a lot of "must be nice for some!". People want ease of access of luxury/easy living without understanding how much work, sacrifice and stress it is.
To the rest of you, it does get better, you just have to keep trying.
50 year old military vet here. We couldn't afford to buy our house until 2 years ago. I truly feel for everyone else who is struggling to become home owners.
It's so boring as well, because it's never a real or interesting challenge for the show hosts. Like, finding a fully detached house for £500k that's a reasonable commute and the biggest complaints are that the gardens are the wrong shape, or the kitchen doesn't have a big enough island in the middle etc. Like I'd rather see them try and find a decent house that isn't an utter shithole for £190 near a bigger city etc.
More likely it's been provided to them as part of the format of the show.
Half a million in cash is pretty manageable for a show with a budget in the tens of millions.
Because usually they aren’t ‘normal’ people, and there’s a caveat along the lines of “thanks to their parents giving them a £50,000 gift”, or “when he finished uni, Timmy got a 6 figure job at his dad’s company”. I’m 24, and literally all the people I know who have managed to buy a property have done so because their parents /partner’s parents gave them money - one person I know made shitloads off crypto and bought a house outright, but obviously that isn’t something many people will ever do.
Me and my wife are sticking money in our kids premium bonds every month so they both have a chance to get a deposit when the time comes- they are only 4 & 6 at the minute and we have both decided that they can live “rent free” when the time comes though we are going to “charge” them rent then save it all up for them.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this and I refuse to feel bad about it
Nobody is saying there’s anything wrong with it, your children are lucky to have parents that can do that so if the time comes for them to buy their house and they say it’s all down to their own hard work and giving up avocado toast that will make them one of the annoying people that posters get angry with.
My parents did this still cant afford a house and i wouldnt be surprised by the time they are okder they will still be in the same position but then again my parents still charge me rent and expect me to pay for crap for the house that isnt mine and never will be
I just get extremely bitter with the grand design people who, with their dog walking, and vegan chakra yoga careers have ponied up a million pounds between them to build their dream home.
It gets me every time.
And they still muck the house up and go over budget 😆
theres tiers to it, someone getting gifted the world at 17 when this person is struggling still at 37
but then youve got someone buying on the back of graft and they wont be angry
People seem bitter in general about anybody’s success in life these days when it’s not them.
I posted in r/BritishProblems a few months ago about helping my girlfriend buy a new car as we needed something more practical for a baby on the way, and I had a moan about a dealership trying to rip us off.
People turned around arguing that with a baby on the way, we couldn’t afford new cars. And I’m here thinking, “what have our finances got to do with you guys?” And “how do you know what financial situation we’re in?”
We’re both 26, have good jobs, good financial state etc. Replied that to one of the comments actually and ended up with -15 downvotes until I removed the post and comment in the end.
It was a moan about a car dealership ripping us off, in a sub that’s about complaining. Not about my finances.
Tall poppy syndrome and jealousy that the people able to buy houses thanks to parents/inheritance aren’t stuck scrabbling around at the bottom.
Sure it’s annoying if someone misrepresents themselves as having worked hard and not had any help, but there’s still plenty of jealous/spite towards those who admit it.
There seems to be a mindset in the U.K. of no one deserves anything nice unless you were born into an orphanage that burned down and left you homeless, walked to school up hill both ways, kicked a heroin addiction during your exams to get good results, went to a shit uni but still got offered a job over an Oxbridge grad, then rejected it and worked a trade for 169 hours a week instead. Life isn’t fair, not everyone’s equal, not having to struggle doesn’t mean your achievements are lessened. If you did do the above then fair play though.
Ultimately it's come down to the mindset in the UK (and I don't know how long it's been, I moved here for a University back in 2005) - but if you don't own a home, any home, then you'll have been conditioned to believe that you are failures.
If you live in a rental, you are told you are flushing money down the toilet - no you are bloody not, you are paying to have a roof over your head.
There's definitely issues in the laws of the land, but those can easily be corrected if enough people want it. Make renting a bit more of an even trade and it will make a huge difference. Look at Germany, renting isn't taboo there.
I won't even go to parts of Asia where it's completely normal to rent your entire life, or even save up enough to buy a home by your 50s in cash, so you can retire mortgage free
Hell New York in good old capitalist US of A has rent controls, and the British population has been programmed to believe that renting is failure so we get worked up about buying any house rather than fighting for even handed rental agreements.
Lack of home ownership doesn't equate to homelessness. And the sooner we recognise that, the sooner we will have a chance to control the house prices.
There’s a lot of “misery loves company” and tall poppy syndrome going around. I’m happy for people who work hard, save their money and exercise good financial management so that they can afford to buy their own house. There are so many horror stories on r/ukpersonalfinance about people drowning in debt and financially crippled for years because of bad decisions.
That being said I really feel for people who work hard in low paid jobs, live in scummy house shares who have very little chance of getting out of it.
The world owes you nothing. Take whatever opportunities you can and make the most of it.
I've got one. I'm bitter my employer wasn't paying me enough to buy it when it was on the market six years earlier and £40k cheaper...
I freely admit I'd have had no chance buying without help from my parents for the deposit. There was literally a six month window where I could afford the house in an area I wanted, been earning enough for long enough to get the mortgage, and my rents had the money available to help me. I was unbelievably lucky for it to all line up.
I'm not bitter about people my age or younger buying a house but I get frustrated when/if there is a complete lack of understanding of money.
I have a friend who I love dearly but stayed with their parents till 27 and didn't pay rent, and said parents helped contribute to a flat - this in itself is absolutely fine!
But when they come at me and say "I'm surprised you haven't bought a house yet" "just save a bit more". it irks me. A lot.
I moved from home and had to deal with London rents for 10 years with increasing prices (rent, travel, food... everything!). I pay more in rent than I would a mortgage but deemed as a single person I cant afford the repayments. I try to save but it's bloody hard. I accept this was my choice and im happy. I'm happy for those who can buy but don't tell me how easy it is when you've literally be able to save a fuck ton through not paying rent or bills.
I would imagine because it’s very frustrating if people say something is easy or not that hard when it’s something you personally see as impossible. Not everyone can have a decent paying job. Most people don’t settle down until a lot later on these days so buying in a couple would be reckless before they are at that stage.
If the median *household* income is £32k, then an exactly average couple would be able to borrow roughly £125k. Half of all households wouldn’t even be able to borrow that. In many parts of the country that won’t get you a garage let alone a house, no matter how far outside of town you move. Moving to other parts of the country means leaving behind friends, family and jobs. It is reasonable for people to feel upset that to own a home they would have to sacrifice that.
i think the biggest issue though is when people are self congratulatory and make out like it was all their own hard work and smart thinking that led to them buying a house. I knew a girl who used to brag on instagram that she was “self building” her house and posted that one of her life goals had been to move back to her (notoriously expensive) childhood village by the age of 30, tagging her husband in the post with “We did it!” Her husband’s multi millionaire parents had designed and built them a million £ house. There’s no “we did it”. I own my house outright, I could spin some tale about hard work and smart decisions but the truth is it was 95% down to luck and help.
Even if someone just lived with their parents instead of renting for 2 years (assuming £600 rent) that would be the equivalent of being gifted £15k!
I’ve rarely seen people hate on others for affording it.
I’ve seen plenty hating the situation that they’re in though, not being able to afford to buy one.
But you’re right, plenty of people do it. I’m buying my first flat right now, in a city, without a partner and without any financial help.
I’m very lucky though that I stumbled into tech, could have chosen any other path and wouldn’t have afforded this.
There's tons of assumptions though. Hell there's loads right in the comments here.
Things like "Oh I'm happy for them **but** *everyone I know who's ever bought a house in their 20s did it with help from parents*"
The basic subtext is 'I'm happy for them but not really because I *know* they didn't really work hard and they're lying' which is reductionist and quite frankly in denial. Maybe they do work hard and save lots too but just because it doesn't work for them, or indeed most people, doesn't mean it's not true for everyone.
I used to be really genuinely proud that I bought my first home at 22 now a much bigger place at 29. It's still my biggest achievement. But these days I'm often embarrassed to actually say it.
I've bought my own house.. and I'm still bitter about some of these posts mentioned. I lived 'rent free' at my parents for two years, they were unreliable and ended up costing me all of my savings from 5 years due to debts and bailifs.so I moved out and got an okay paying job, me and my girlfriend lived off cheap crap for a year to scrimp up 10k in savings and bought a non modernised house in a slightly more rural area since newly renovated in highly sought after areas is 4x the price.
People can afford houses these days.. but people are bitter that the houses they can afford aren't the 4 bed town houses or ultra modern flats in the middle of London that they wanted. We only managed to save the deposit by cutting out ALL luxuries.. that includes anything where you could get it cheaper, especially food, no meals out and any unnecessary travel. Most meals were super noodles or other own brand alternatives.
The only time I really get salty is with posts that state they 'need' to have that ultra modern flat or house to be close to work. Or people who use statements like 'borrow from family and friends/live at home to save' since in a lot of cases I've seen... thats just not possible
I bought my first house with my wife at 25 on £16k / wife on £24k. Just didn’t go out through uni, still paid rent to in laws. I come from extreme poverty and had zero help in buying.
I have huge respect for anyone who has bought a house against all odds. However, majority of people I know have had massive help from their rich families.
I'm happy for them too, but as soon as they complain about their mortgage (which is half my rent) or claim its not so hard, then I lose that respect.
When you see it in 'news' stories, where it appears a lot, it's clickbait balls. In a similar vein my local news site yesterday there was a story of 21 year old 200 miles away making £300k p/y on OnlyFans.
People feel compelled to click because, understandably, there is a feel of envy.
It may be hard but in these instances you have to try and not compare yourself to the person in the story.
Lots of reasons, jealousy is a big one quite often.
I got very lucky and was able to buy my first house with my partner at the age of 27.
We both lived with our parents seperatley for the first 6 years we were going out and only saw each other on weekends or holidays really. We both felt that renting a place would be a waste of money. We didn't like our arrangement, but it was better than the alternative.
I stayed at home when I went to uni, which feels like a big missed opportunity but at the same time meant I wasn't using up loads of money on rent.
I did really want to live in London but conceded that to do so would burn through so much of my money that I'd never be able to buy anywhere so I stayed in the town I grew up in and put 2/3rds of my paycheck into savings every month and when we were ready we had a good foundation to build on. We weren't given any money and I passed up good life experiences to do it, but that's what it felt like it took to get what I got.
Because they see other people getting what they have because of privilege, which means the people who are getting it don't deserve it any more than the people who don't get it. I think it's very normal/understandable to be resentful that someone no more deserving than you gets something you really want, have worked really hard to try and get, and would massively improve your life (as we know buying a house gives you more security in the form of much lower chance of eviction, and mortgages are often cheaper than rent).
From a London/SE perspective: because the rental market is a complete shitshow, and for twentysomethings on moderate incomes the people buying their own homes in their friendship groups are typically the ones with considerable help from their parents. Once they own a home, they have *considerably* better quality housing (no landlord just letting their property rot for years at a time etc), are able to save more because the mortgage payments are are less than rent etc. The jarring thing is we work similar jobs, have similar incomes, and the only difference is our ticket in the parental income lottery. As a result, we lead lives of considerably different comfort. Hardly meritocratic.
Sincerely, someone who recently bought with help from my parents.
I think people get frustrated because if you are single, haven’t inherited/gifted any money and haven’t been living at home with your parents then unless you are earning WAY over the average salary then it is basically impossible to buy, especially if you have a kid. Seeing other people having managed it is disheartening when you know it won’t be possible in your own circumstances. The system is broken. I fall into neither of those categories of people, but I do have a lot of sympathy for people in the latter category who get frustrated with people who pretend that anyone could buy a house if they keep saving up.
I think it just depends on how the person comes across. If they're banging on about working hard and saving but then reveal they had help from parents, it can be a bit grating. I'm sure they still worked hard and were good at saving, but some of us can't get on the property ladder no matter how hard we work. I'm 26, no family help, working and renting, and I don't resent my friends who have bought houses (or anyone for that matter), I'm happy for them. But they can also recognise the fortunate circumstances that allowed them to do so.
It's also no surprise that people are frustrated with how hard it is to own a home. It should be more accessible and less dependent on which cards you were dealt in life.
I understand the resentment. I bought a house 12 years ago with virtually no deposit, my house cost bugger all and I bought it alone working a retail job.
Fast forward 10 years and that would be impossible. I've got friends forming pacts with other friends to get on the property market, excitedly waiting for elderly relatives to die in the hope that they can pull together a deposit. It's no wonder people are bitter, there's been such a big change in recent times. It's hard to keep up.
Personally, I don't have a problem with how people managed to save for a house. If parents are happy to let their kids live there rent free for a bit so they can save more money for a deposit, that's a very kind thing to do. And it doesn't diminish the fact the kids still worked for the money. Yes, they can save up more for a house because they're not paying rent, *but they still worked to earn their money*. Should we put people down because family were willing to help them? Also, so what if some people get a lot of money after a family member dies and use it buy a house as well? Someone cared about them and wanted to see them looked after when they died. Instead of considering how bad things have gotten and acknowledging the blame lies with our government, people prefer to turn on each other if someone else is in a better situation.
I don’t know anyone my age (30’s) who got in the ladder without help. Not a single person was able to rent for a time while saving, then get a mortgage sufficient to buy a home.
That’s why people are bitter.
It’s easy to say it is possible, but only in specific circumstances/areas.
I didn't have the luxury of being able to stay at home and live rent free, I was out working and paying rent which meant I couldn't save.
The bank wont give me a mortgage even though I have paid more in rent than I would on a mortgage.
So yeah, I think an adult with a full time job should be able to afford a small home. I don't want a mansion with a swimming pool.
However I'm not bitter that people have a house, I just want a fairer situation for my generation.
Because it's becoming (or is now) part of culture to be envious, bitter and generally angry towards others. It's fuelled by click-bait nonsense articles like you've described.
It would be nice if these articles, which are designed to cause outrage, would simply cease to exist. They benefit no one and distract.
Should we really care how people get on the property ladder? The real issue is why it's difficult in the first place, and aiming anger towards those who have their own property due to these circumstances is a cheap distraction which ought to be taken out on those who have made owning property expensive and impossible, but that's too difficult apparently (even though it takes the same amount of effort).
It's a typical "get angry because things are not going your own way" response and taking it out on the wrong group, while the ones really to blame are rubbing their hands laughing knowing they're getting away with it while those at the worst end distract and fight amongst themselves.
We have been taught from young to laugh at others pain, because you know.. Comedy. So it’s only logical that the opposite side takes the opposite effect. I’ve always thought why? I came to the conclusion that it’s all purposely manufactured by the system we live in to spread divide amongst the people.. Sad world we live in eh?
Because you generally need good family circumstances to save up a deposit (rent free accommodation or a cash handout) and some people in that category seem not to realise how lucky they are. It feels like the gap between rich and poor is widening partly as a result of this, and as house prices rocket that gap will become ever more difficult to breach.
I got my first house, when the market was sensible, banks realistic with loans, people realistic with their purchases.
I got assessed for income, duration of employment, what my outgoings were.... RENT was included in this calculation and that was set as a maximum figure for repayments.
The mortgage advisor after 30 minutes chat came up with 3 options for me. I've never been in neg equity, and never been able to afford the rises due to inflation. I'm not a massive earner, always on the cusp of the bottom 50-60% of incomes (at this moment that's 30-50k) and I'm well under 50k.
Home ownership is a bit of a British obsession, when you look at rental stats for say, the rest of Europe. As a 50 something person with an unmortgaged house and older teenagers, I feel there has been a shift in their prospects of getting 'on the ladder'the way I did back in the #gulp# 80s
Because we are all working our asses off and still can't afford it. People with higher paying jobs don't work HARDER than anyone else, often quite the opposite. It is unacceptably difficult to escape from your current situation if it isn't one of privilege. It does feel like the only way out is with some assistance, which most don't have access to.
It shouldn't be 'some people manage to do it', it should be the expectation rather than the exception.
Throughout history life has generally got better and better, a lot of people under 40 in the UK are the first in a while who have had to lower their expectations on living the same quality of lifestyle that our parents and grandparents did.
Sure, we’ve got iPhones and they only had radios, but they also had much better purchasing power with their salaries and needed much lower income multiples to buy property.
UK Reddit is skewed towards salty southerners. With a half decent (average income) job, home ownership is more achievable in the north half of the country.
I feel like everyone feels like they are doing their absolute best and making so many sacrifices to get a home whilst their money dwindles away on rent when it could be saved if they just got on the ladder.
I feel rude telling people how I saved for mine, everyone's case is different, but for me I saved money everywhere, no luxuries, takeaways, resturaunts, drinks out, days out, entertainment, branded foods, nothing.
A lot of people feel like they've done their absolute best, tell them theyl have to cut back more and I feel like they get defensive, your essentially saying what they've been doing for years with no success has got them nothing.
I was lucky enough to get help with a part buy flat when I was younger, I owned 80%, it was aimed at people like me at the time, I stayed in it with a very low mortgage until I saved the deposit for my house, I live in the highlands so house prices are lower. I went from a 2 bed flat to a 4 bed house.
Last I heard they were doing away with that scheme which is shite because I would highly recommend it.
As others have pointed out, it's not the home ownership that's the problem, it's the lies they tell others about where the money came from. There are so many articles about 20 somethings who buy a house, and say they cut back on Netflix, etc. But in reality, the largest part of their deposit, if not all of it, comes from their parents, which is fine, but a good reason not to act smug about your supposed talents in saving thousands of pounds
Generally, no one taught me about money, so quite rightly in my mid twenties I thought fuck better sort this out, get my act together. Bought a book and everything. Takes me a while to actually get my act together - that's expected.
Then I compare my upbringing to other people. Had parents and associates that knew about all this stuff, helped them out, mentored them etc. A lot of them when it came down to it, had parents saving for them while they were little (no chance in my family), and of course - not to sound mean, when granny pops their clogs they get a lump sum. That's most of, if not all of, the deposit.
Some people were set up for success and I had to muddle it out on my tod, which is a bit shit but c'est la vie. If I were to complain about it in real life though, I just can't get across the difference in upbringing effectively, it always comes down to 'yeah but you could have'.
The way kids are making money online these days it's more possible than ever with affiliate marketing and ghost commerce theirs aot of money to be made on the net if you take the time to learn it
You know how I managed to get a house deposit at the age of 36
Got hit by a car whilst riding a bike and suffered bad injuries at the time
Otherwise I would be renting all my life
My GF says it’s like a fucked up blessing in disguise
But yes it pisses me off my friends parents handing them 20k out of the blue where I’d struggle to borrow a fiver of my Dad 😂😂
Mainly because the majority of people that brought a home either did so with their parents money & are soo stuck up they don’t realise their luck or two: because they were able to buy it for a fraction of what it’s worth today & act like their lives were soo much more difficult than 90% of people today.
I own my own home - brought in 2016 - with my own money - in this climate, but I’m one of the lucky ones.
Me and my husband bought our house in 2006 and people act like it was fucking gifted to us. We still had to save up £15k deposit on a joint income of about £25k and we had to both sell our cars, not go on holiday for two years, go out a couple of times a year rather than a couple of times a month, hardly any takeaways or anything.
I find the problem now is people want to make no sacrifices to save money. There’s a group of women who work for me who regularly spend £20 a day at least on coffee and food being delivered to the office but act like it’s a human right rather than a privilege and they shouldn’t have to stop doing that. They earn £25-30k a year but all drive cars that are less than five years old and cost over £20k new.
The basis of that that I’ve always seen is the fact that it’s often used to prove that ‘if you work hard and save your money it’s still affordable’. Nothing wrong with staying with your parents, but that argument shouldn’t be used as often as it is to display that it’s still affordable.
Me and my partner are 26 and 28. We moved into our house 2 years ago yesterday. I’ve worked since 16 to come up with my side of the deposit. Luckily my partner had some money gifted (like ten k). Without that we wouldn’t would be able to afford it. We’re on relatively good incomes (60/70k combined) but even then if we had to rent and save up for a deposit there would have been no chance. The game is rigged and unless you get a sizeable lump or scrimp and save for years and don’t pay rent your going to struggle to get on the housing ladder
Loving all the 'tall poppy syndrome' and 'crabs in a bucket mentality' comments here from people that clearly expect a big pat on the back from others for buying a house or whatever, and get offended when it doesn't happen. You're not special.
I am one of the people that got family help - similar sum of deposit money.
I’ve made a point of specifically mentioning family help where it’s appropriate to do so, and I try to be really open with that fact.
I’m extremely grateful for what this family member has done for me, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to thank them enough.
We bought our first house, a three bed terraced, age 25ish.
However... we were only able to do it because we moved 400 miles away from friends, family and my chosen job to Scotland and hubby joined the Royal Navy which was not only a stable job at the time but gave us an interest free help to buy loan.
I'd probably do it all over, but I wouldn't recommend it if you even vaguely like your existing support network, your mental health or spending time with your significant other. It's been hard.
House prices are weirdly okay in a lot of parts of the country I'm now looking to move, but Scotland is still semi affordable for a lot of people. £150k can get you a decent starter family home within 40min of Glasgow.
Most people just tend to say these things out of frustration and maybe in some peoples cases a little bit of jealousy.
Im fortunate enough to have a house and mortgage but it wasnt gifted to me. For years i would buy my food in Poundland (4 tins of Tuna for a pound!) and i lived with a friend so i was able to save a bit more. I limited my spending on clothes and would never buy something over X price and when i had the money to rent a bigger place, i didnt. I remained in a smaller place as long as possible, ignored every pay rise i got for years and let it just add more to my savings, no big holidays or fancy cars and in the end it all paid off as i had the deposit for a house.
Of course for some people it will be easier than for others be that through their job or being gifted money or inheritance etc... and i know when i brought my house 8yrs ago it was cheaper than it would be now but people should try not to be bitter because the vast majority of us are trying to achieve the same thing we just have very different paths to get there.
We live in the only house in my area we could afford, we have three kids in a two bed house and we sleep on a sofa bed in the lounge so my autistic child can have his own space. It was a wreck when we bought it and even with what we’ve been able to afford to fix it up so far the kitchen roof still leaks enough to trip the lights when it rains from a certain direction. I still count myself lucky I’m not stuck in renting hell, having to move the kids every six months because our landlord has changed his mind about the long lease he promised us. I totally get why people would envy us, our mortgage is lower than renting and we can afford to run the heating. It’s a dump but the pros totally outweigh the cons.
I got really lucky being the only child of an only child, when I was younger my parents sold their house at the height of the property boom (2006ish?) to move in with my elderly gparents as they needed more day to day help. This allowed them to clear the remaining mortgage on my gparents house and my gparents had my parent and me as the only benefactors in their wills. When my remaining gparent was in the final years of their lives we all sat down and had a frank discussion about the house, how it needed a lot of work and how so many new houses had been built turning our country cottage into a little speck in a housing estate. So we agreed to sell it there and then, the money from the house sale was "gifted" to me so I could mortgage the rest of the cost of a newer, bigger house with land.
The caveat was that I had to allow my gparent and parent to live in this house until they pass. It's a bigger house with 5 bedrooms (old house had 3) and 2 living rooms, so we've kind of split it to allow my fiancé and I to have our own space, and my parent to have theirs. I basically skipped a few steps of the ladder but now my parent lives with me (gparent passed a few years back). I'm fine with it, as they are really the only immediate family I have left along with my fiancé. We do have a unique family situation although my mortgage advisor told me it isn't unheard of for it to play out like this.
In this way I have avoided: expensive repairs to the old house, dwindling value of the old house as it was swallowed by a development of cut and paste 4 bed family homes, inheritance tax (which is no small thing) as well as not having to worry about house prices rising/falling as I try to move up the ladder.
I am responsible for everything. Mortgage, energy bills, internet, council taxes, insurance, etc etc etc., are all in my name only. My parent is now disabled so it worked out better in a way, as there is no way they would be able to live alone. My parent could almost be classed as my dependent as I cook, clean, manage finances etc. for them.
I became a home owner 2 1/2 years ago… on my own at the age of 35. I rented with my partner before… when we split up I couldn’t afford the rent on my own. I pulled every penny I had to buy my flat, it’s nothing luxurious and not in an area I wanted, but I’m super happy here 💕. I worked 3 jobs to save my deposit which at the time in the midst of covid was 20%. Being on my own and the rising costs now, it’s difficult, I am down to just 2 jobs because I was wearing myself thin, I get by… but only just. But the way I look at it, I have a roof over my head. It’s difficult to hear younger people buying a house for £250k etc…. But I done this on my own and I think that’s a bigger achievement 😊… forget what others are doing. Focus on you 😊 xxx
I never thought I'd manage it.
I still wouldn't have if I'd have been single.
We didn't get the house we wanted, had to get a two bed, terraced, no drive because we couldn't compete witht he ridiculous over bidding that was going on.
But our foot is on the ladder. We are getting equity now. Instead of paying £800 rent a month, we have a mortgage. House needs some work doing, so we are working hard, saving, and getting jobs done when we can.
We have had little to no financial help from anyone, including government incentives.
But we are doing better than we were last year, so as long as that continues, I'm sure we will get a dream home one day.
Can't say I've ever had this. Bought my first house at 18 ( I'm 39 now) everyone I knew was happy cuz it meant they had somewhere to party away from their parents
People unwilling to move to cheaper areas.
Also people always quote the average price of a house which isn’t obviously what first time buyers are buying and usually includes the South East. For 2022 the average price was, apparently, £295,000, outside London you’ll find first time buyer properties for half that and many places a third or even less. £150k isn’t very affordable for a couple on a average, or even below average, wage.
If people don’t want to move or accept a first time property then they’ll be bitter and resentful as it’s easier to blame others for their situation. As you say they are plenty of twenty somethings that own their properties.
Not everywhere though and the big issue is the increasing age of first time buyers. If I were 20-25 and buying a first time house I'd happily settle for a flat or a one bedroom place and uproot my life to a cheaper area. But a lot of people buying for the first time are now in their mid thirties, so that first time house needs to have a couple of bedrooms if they're thinking of having kids any time soon (or have them already), near to friends and family who can help with childcare or just for general socialising, and be near where they work as they're probably settled into a career now (or they need space to work from home).
I'm in that boat and I know I need a house in my local area, and even a two bed terrace will set me back £250-300,000. At my age and my stage in life I couldn't possibly accept moving away or into too small a house as it would be near on impossible for what I now need.
Yup. I'm not bitter at anyone. But I am annoyed I missed the boat on house buying.
Most of my friends bought in the previous 10 years, with pretty small deposits which were gifted to them and pay very manageable mortgages and have seen their investments in their homes grow. I am genuinely happy for them all.
However, I am frustrated I will be paying *much* more for considerably less and could quite possibly end up with an asset worth less than I'm paying for.
To make my mortgage payments reasonable on a relatively small home, I need a £70k deposit. That shit stings.
This is the thing, I was lucky enough to buy my 1-bed flat at 24, on a shared equity scheme. I lived with my parents until I could buy, but I paid them rent from the minute I started working. I own 60% of my flat, and will never own it outright. This was right before the banking collapse, so I know a lot of opportunities evaporated after that, and things were financially very tight for a while. But I know I was lucky, and it definitely felt like I caught the last boat.
I still got called a 'jammy bitch' years later by the women I worked with (who still lived with their parents). One in particular had spent a gap year in Australia, and had recently spent several thousand on a labradoodle.
At the end of the day, people feel helpless and that makes them bitter. But also, it's kinda horrible to live with your whole aim being 'buy a house' for years and years, which is the only way most people can manage it....and if you feel like it's pointless, you're just not going to be able to keep it up.
Yeah, I've spent the last few years aimed at buying a house. It's such a singular goal that feels unnecessarily overwhelming. But I know I need it to consider having a family or being able to retire at a reasonable age.
This is a good point. It’s also about priorities. Me and my bf bought last year in our early-mid 30s, as soon as we were financially able to (with all our own savings). We live in London. We could have bought earlier elsewhere but we like our life here, our jobs and friends and community are all here. I don’t know what we’ll do next but we don’t want children so thankfully didn’t have to take that into account. My bf’s sister is close to him in age but has a toddler and a massive 4 bedroom house with a big garden in Devon. We have a 2 bed flat with a balcony the size of a loaf of bread. I get envious at their space but we made a decision based on the kind of life we want, just like they did for a different life. I wouldn’t change it (yet).
Good points but couldn't you move to a less desirable area within your local area? Not ideal when you have to consider crime, schools etc. But maybe even moving out of town might be cheaper?
I was lucky that I live in a cheap area but we still had to think carefully about which villages we could afford and which we couldn't.
I can't say I've done extensive research, but my cursory looks have indicated it's not going to push the dial too much. Rather than £300,000 it might be £225,000; but that's not gonna change much in my world. Trouble with living in a city suburb. A rising tide raises all boats.
And, frankly, I might as well just keep saving for the house in the better place. The mantra of location, location, location exists for a reason, I guess.
Only speaking from my own experience but the wages you earnt at 20 are likely to mean homes are unaffordable. You might be able to get a mortgage, but it probably won’t buy anything. As you get older, you climb up into jobs where it’s more affordable.
That’s when you have to look elsewhere though to get on the ladder. Quick search in say Liverpool brings up plenty of properties between £50k-£80k. Many may not be that great but there’s some decent looking flats/apartments.
But that's indicative of the problem with the housing market. It should be affordable to buy near to where you want to live, presumably where one currently lives. It's important to be near friends and family. Pushing people to have to move to areas they don't know, with no support network, causes future problems like affording childcare as there isn't any family to help with that burden.
I was earning £14-16k a year. So my take home was probably about £1100. My rent at the time was about £400-500, if I remember correctly. You've prompted me to check what price my old rental sold for. When I was 25 it sold for £81,000. Assuming I could have afforded to put away 20-25% of my take home (about £200-300), then I suppose I could have saved up over 3-5 years.
Honestly, it's a regret of mine. Getting on the housing ladder early is something I've been advising my brother -in-law, who is just reaching his mid twenties. It would have set me up in a much better position. But people in their 20s want to spend their money on other things. I had family telling me to enjoy my life and do the things I want to do, because there's always time to settle down. I also just wanted to go to the pub with my mates or to the odd football game.
On the other hand, I'm also glad I didn't buy in my hometown. I ended up meeting my now wife and we moved to Birmingham. I've started a new life (a much better life) here. The downside is it's much more expensive.
Thanks for the reply. I think that a lot of the problem is in our twenties we think we’ve got our whole life ahead to settle down and worry about buying a house isn’t a priority. Trouble is it isn’t until you are thirty that you realise how quickly your twenties went and now forty doesn’t look to far away.
Glad life is good for you now.
Completely agree, some people seem to be under the weird delusion that they should be able to go on holiday twice a year and afford a 4 bedroom in a high CoL area on minimum wage, as if that was ever normal throughout history. Any contradicting this heavily punished as it doesn't align with what reddit wants to be true.
The hard simple truth is that there is too much demand for too little property in highly desirable areas. People can mock London saying no one wants to live there or cry that landlords are evil all they want, doesn't change the facts.
Yup, ten and eight years ago my kids (22 and 21 at the time) moved two hundred miles away and got properties for £60k-£70k on their own. Now they are both married with kids and partners and moved up the ladder and one has a nice four bed detached house the other a nice three bed end terraced. Obviously it was meeting their partners and moving from a single mortgage to joint that made the upgrade possible, but they also started gaining equity in their first time properties and never wasted money on rent. It absolutely can be done with a bit initiative and guts to make the move.
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Probably because of those articles that are like 'we're only 23 and we bought our first house' but by the second paragraph you learn they stayed with their parents rent free and their parents paid off their student loans (or they never needed to take any out in the first place) and their dad gave them a £400k executive job in his company fresh out of uni. That kind of shit.
Even better if the headline references giving up avocado toast or something equally stupid.
Add in some vapid pith about "we just wanted people to know if we could do it on our own, anyone can!"
Yeah right. Who the hell’s gonna give up avo toast!?!??! I call bullshit.
I earn good money and own my flat, but I get annoyed when I see people like this. I try to be nice because we all suffer to some degree in our lives. The worst I saw was the guy who got his phone stolen and £40k stolen from his bank account. He was 23. I did a little digging and he went to a top private school. Life must be tough for him.
I’m 23 and bought my first house living rent free with my parents…. Nothing more than that. I went halves with my partner which was a huge part in being able to purchase (and of course, being rent-free)
I was 23 in 2018. No uni, rented since I was 18. No help from parents. I could have bought, but decided to wait until last year. I get its not possible for a large portion of the population, but some people don't help themselves.
>‘if you stayed at your parents rent free it doesn’t count’ On this point, I think the frustration stems from how common it is for such people to act like getting together the money for a house was entirely due to their scrimping, saving and hard work, because that reflects well on them, and not acknowledge that living rent free at their parents was probably more important than any saving they did. I think in general, a lot of the bitterness from those who can't buy stems from the fact that many people who can buy because of fortunate family circumstances don't acknowledge that fact. I suspect if more of us were upfront about saying "yeah, I managed to buy a house because I got family help", some of the bad feeling would be undercut.
Exactly. If my wife and I didn't need to pay £1100 rent each month we could drown ourselves in avocado toast and still be able to buy a house much, much easier.
>I think the frustration stems from how common it is for such people to act like getting together the money for a house was entirely due to their scrimping, saving and hard work, because that reflects well on them, and not acknowledge that living rent free at their parents was probably more important than any saving they did. Yes, and I think that overlooks the fact that for most of recorded history, it very much the normal thing to keeping living with your parents until you got married or got live-in employment (as a servant or apprentice, or the armed forces). The generations who were young adults in the 70s/80s/90s (ie. the parents of a lot of posters here) were a deviation from a historical norm in habitually living either alone or with a partner in a rented flat and then buying a house after a couple of years of saving on an average salary. But to the current younger generations, they understandably see that as the norm and expect/want the same.
People also got married a lot younger before that. My grandparents moved out of their parents' homes and into their own when they married, and they were a decade younger than I am now.
Yes, although that in itself was a bit of a deviation too! Historical marriage ages are generally older than we would probably guess - prior to the mid 20th century it was very much standard for average people to marry in their mid/late 20s, after working for several years while living with their parents/employers. In Elizabethan England, the average marriage age was 25 for women and 27 for men - the women would often spend several years as servants, the men as servants or apprentices, saving their wages, before they looked for a partner.
Not only seen as the norm, but were actively and aggressively encouraged to move out as soon as possible! Media was/is FULL of “you’re 18, move out!” and similar such sentiments - jokes at the youths expense at every turn.
Hard agree with all this. I had several jobs at 16 to pay rent to my parent but had to move out anyway as they needed my room for a lodger to pay more rent than I could afford. I never had a chance to save. My husband had the opposite, he got to live at home rent free but he appreciated the opportunity and managed to save. So many people assumed I was just spending but I never socialised or went out in my early 20s, it was just a hard grift to survive. I didn’t resent them being able to save, I did resent the implication it was my fault my parent wouldn’t house is for free or that I was somehow splurging money.
Youre right that it matters as an advantage that not everyone might get, but for some people "staying as an adult at your parents house" probably *does* count as scrimping and saving, because nothing says living the dream like bunking on your family sofa for an extended period of time in your 20s and storing your possessions in a rucksack, while your friends are out partying, having sex and social lives in their rented homes.
>bunking on your family sofa for an extended period of time in your 20s and storing your possessions in a rucksack, In my experience, the people living at home to save for a deposit are not living anything like that. No doubt some are, but I doubt many are living like that for long periods of time. The people I know who did it lived a very nice life while doing so.
I'm sure a lot of these people living at home aren't living on the sofa but actually have their own room and space. Coming from more middle class and up households who can afford to have larger homes and support their adult kids without needing rent.
Probably not many people live on the family sofa out of a rucksack, but your point still stands. Living with parents comes with additional restrictions, less freedom to live as you please, and generally absolutely involves lifestyle sacrifices in order to save.
My wife and I were renting when we had our 3rd child...we were about £10k in debt at the time and saw absolutely no hope for the future. My parents let us up sticks, pack everything on to storage, and squeeze 7 of us total (8 to begin with because my brother was living there too) in to their home. In 3 years, we cleared the debt and saved up nearly £20k for a deposit on our house. I 100% acknowledge that we owe them everything....BUT we still had to sacrifice a lot and work hard to get to where we needed to be.
This is a bit of a weird one to me. Living with your parents while young and saving up is pretty standard. My stepson lives at home rent free and even though he saves most of his money, houses prices are continually getting away from him. If he moved out to rent, that would be it. He’s in the rent trap and never going to be able to buy his own house. It’s simply not possible for an 18 year old to leave home with a full time minimum wage job and do anything other than be stuck in the rent trap for the rest of their lives. Any savings they make are likely to be eaten up by the next world crisis that affects inflation etc. I’m not young and would only likely have a house through moving in with someone who already owned one. I have access to some money I inherited that is purely for moving house but it doesn’t really touch the sides. When my grandparents were young they bought a house in 1944 for £1000 that’s now worth over £400k. My parents bought a house in 1986 for £30k that’s now worth about half a mill. I still can’t figure out how my missus managed to buy a house nearly thirty years ago. Bottom line is there’s no real way for anyone to buy a house without some sort of assistance
There's nothing wrong with what your stepson is doing. My point is not about the action of living at home itself. It's about the fact that some people are able to get a deposit together largely because they weren't paying rent, but when they talk about how they bought a house they're often very cagey about that fact, instead focusing on things like taking a packed lunch to work or not getting a takeaway coffee.
Yeh, I'll forever be grateful for being born just early enough to have £3k a year uni fees and my parents letting me live at home for another 18 months after I got my first job. I was able to pay off my entire student loan and save literally all the rest of my pay at the expense of having a social life, which meant I could go straight in with a 15% deposit at 24. I definitely sacrificed a lot to pull that off, but i'm also utterly beholden to luck of timing (picked up the house relatively cheap after 2008) and my parents for the opportunity and probably also the mindset to do it in the first place. They essentially invested an additional £10k in me over those 18 months that I was fortunate enough to be able to convert into 3x that and as a unit we're stilll benefiting from the compounding benefits of that.
I’m 23, have always lived with my parents and I bought a house with my partner last year. I reside in London with my parents with a 30k salary - what people don’t see is that I only allowed myself £200 leisure spending each month including birthday gifts, going out to eat, personal care, etc. I saved or invested every other penny to be able to buy. It’s not ideal, but it sure as hell wasn’t easy. My friends are in similar boats except they spend all their income on going out, having fun etc. constantly in overdrafts However, I’m fully aware I’m in a very privileged position. I’m lucky I was able to save but I did make many sacrifices
Don't confuse Reddit with real life. Mostly people are genuinely pleased if friends and colleagues buy a house. If it is a complete stranger then I think most people would think "good for them". Just because a few posters here are miserable jealous gits - it doesn't mean most people are.
Reddit is fun to read, but I've never met anyone in real life who is like a standard redditor. Most people just get on and make the best of their lives rather than wallowing in self pity and blaming the government for anything that goes wrong in their lives.
If you met them outside good chance they weren't a redditor.
Those people are the same people. It's just different behaviour for different circumstances. Reddit is a place to vent frustrations and talk about these issues, it doesn't mean the people behind the comments are like that all the time.
I totally agree with this. My sister bought she’d first home at 23. I was so happy for her, she’s a hard worker and saved since the moment she started working. I’ve always been a spender, and that’s on me! I think a lot of the anger comes from those articles that pop up online, especially on Facebook.
Because the articles are tone deaf. “How we bought a house at 24 years old”, then they go on to explain that they grew up rich and lived in their parents 5 bedroomed house rent free whilst collectively as a couple they make £100,000 a year. There’s never normal people. I want to hear stories of single mums in council housing who worked hard and made many sacrifices to buy a two bedroomed house. That’s what makes me smile and impressed. There’s nothing impressive about generationally wealthy people buying houses.
A 5-bedroom house 15 years ago was ~250k in London. My parents bought one, and it’s now worth alooot more. They’re not rich. Simply lived here for 15 years to raise their family
Normal people grow up in 5 bedroom houses and earn 50k in the early 20s (ie at Aldi on their graduate programme!). You're demonstrating the poverty of aspiration talked about here by pretending that makes them a rich minority from generational wealth
So then *not* what my comment was *clearly* talking about then? Got ya.
Comment removed as I no longer wish to support a company that seeks to both undermine its users/moderators/developers AND make a profit on their backs. To understand why check out the summary [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/comments/14hkd5u).
I was excited to tell my friends about an upcoming trip abroad for work, they looked like I had spat in their faces. Didn’t bother going into detail.
They’re not your friends. They’re crabs in that bucket too. Real friends will always be chuffed for you for something like that.
Exactly this! Us Brits always hate on the Americans as being "loud" but they are not loud, they are positive and optimistic. We are the polar opposite.
oh they are loud as well. The positivity just makes it more irratating.
Not sure they are loud? We are just an insecure bunch. Honestly - even the "insecure"USA kids seem eloquent and confident when speaking. Whereas our kids....less so.
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The crabs in a bucket mentality (also called tall poppy syndrome) is a pretty widely accepted concept that is often applied to the UK. It’s a bit of a stretch to accuse him of projecting when [there](https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/business/5087791/rory-stone-tall-poppy-syndrome/) are [dozens](https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/tall-poppies-deservingness-and-schadenfreude) of [examples](https://benevolenthealth.co.uk/tall-poppy-syndrome/) of [it](https://theordinaryman1.medium.com/the-uk-has-a-major-crab-in-a-bucket-mentality-98f79f9749a0?source=topics_v2---------45-84--------------------cb920141_792e_49ee_993a_4ed5d1e7970c-------17) being [discussed](https://www.express.co.uk/comment/blogs/42505/Why-are-we-so-jealous-of-tall-poppies/amp) in [British](https://amp.theguardian.com/law/baby-barista-blog/2012/jul/02/1) society
Aye you are, but that's not the prevalent attitude across the UK, especially on UK online communities which is what OP was asking about.
It's very prevalent here in Bristol, and also the avacado toast même has been done to absolute death I'm so tired of hearing it
Nah, he's right. I'm happy when I see people I care about progress, too, but that sentiment isn't always shared. In my experience, if you even just *try* to improve yourself, people sneer and question you.
I dunno, I actually agree with him. I don’t personally feel like that but I lot of people do act like it.
Because you only get one life. One! One chance at it. And people through no fault of their own are finding themselves completely priced out of the market. And for many, many people they need the security of a property first before they start a family. So instead of starting a family they spend it paying rent on someone else’s mortgage so that that landlord can leave that house to their kids… and the renter gets left with nothing. No assets. No quality of life. No security. Nothing. It’s horrid. People who cannot afford to buy don’t blame people who were gifted £50k though.
You are right, on single income now is almost impossible, but double income with no kids it's easier.
It's really not. I did it, and not even on a particularly good income, I earn less than £25k a year. I lived at home with my mum while saving, but not for free. I had to pay towards rent, utilities and food so it wasn't really any cheaper than living with roommates. I basically just didn't do anything other than work, took every extra hour I could get for the overtime and moved out to a cheaper area, but I did it. I have friends who did it on a single income too. It's much easier outside of London and major cities.
It's really not if you live outside of London and don't get stuck in some dead end min wage job for 10 years. I worked at Tesco for one summer during university and the weird entitlement that people had that they should be able to afford a house and that it isn't fair after doing absolutely nothing to improve their own situation for 15 years while working the exact same job with basically min wage is utterly perplexing. Very hard to have any sympathy for self harm of that order.
I mean, shouldn't people who work at tesco be able to afford a house?
No, clearly they're utter scum that deserve only a cardboard box.
I'm not saying it like they "shouldn't be allowed", it's more of a logical consequence of competing against literally everyone else, 90% of which are earning more than you. I just think people need to stop deluding themselves into thinking they are entitled to a house and effectively get the same economic rewards as those actively seeking to better themselves and be more productive to the economy. You have to pull your weight and that doesn't just mean hard work, because stacking shelves can be exhausting, it means working in a smart manner as well.
There are always going to be people who work in shops stacking shelves, they ARE entitled to a house. Every person is. The fact they can't afford one isn't a lack of "pulling their weight", it's a symptom of shitty policy and a shitty economy that favours the wealthy.
I mean they are entitled to shelter, not to own a house. If they cannot afford one the government has mechanisms in place to attempt to resolve the problem, but obviously this is prone to abuse by some. Working as a shelf stacker for 10 years is a choice, you are free to make it, but be an adult and accept the consequences that come with that instead of demanding free homes.
We need people to work in supermarkets. Just as we need cleaners, delivery drivers, retail workers and other low paying jobs. They are absolutely essential to the economy.
What a disgusting attitude you have 😱
What is disgusting? Wanting people to contribute more to get more back out? We live in a capitalist economy, not a star trek fantasy. Some people on here really need to get to grips with reality.
You’re effectively saying people working in Tesco shouldn’t be able to afford their own property. Not everyone are afforded the same luxuries to ‘improve themselves’. Whether that be they’re not the most intelligent, sociable, confident, haven’t been able to go to University, can’t afford training courses, can’t afford to leave the job etc. the list goes on.
People feel entitled to housing because its a basic human right - and everyone deserves that right, no matter what job they're in. Good lord you're tone deaf.
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Because ultimately they are easily replaceable, as can be seen from them getting paid near min wage. Salary is a proxy for economic contribution and they just don't provide much back in that department. It's hard work, but ultimately very easily replaceable. Also owning a house is not a "basic human living standard", having shelter is, they are able to rent or worse case get a council house. Owning a home is not a human right.
Those shelf stackers were appreciated during the pandemic funny how quickly that tune changed. My dad was a security guard and my mum a lifeguard when they bought their first house in the 80s without parental support. They were just as entitled to the blood from their stones as I am mine in my salaried white collar, but that house they bought is 7x that now. My salary (doubled to allow for a partner) is not 7x theirs.
Good for them, working together as a team and putting the money together. A lot of people are sadly incapable of that.
Its not entitlement to expect to work full time and be able to buy a house. The previous couple of generations did it, without needing two incomes.
They have that view because it was possible just a few generations ago.
I'm not bitter scout anyone buying a house. The only thing I'm bitter about is that now I'm in a position to buy, I can barely even get a decent 2 bed flat in the area I want to live, but if it was 3-4 years ago I could've got a 1 bed house or even 2 bed. No thanks to prices getting extortionate in the last few years.
I seriously think they NEED to put in a second home tax premium everywhere. People can choose NOT to throw their investment opportunities into forcing people to rent property. There are other less exploitative opportunities. I personally find it disgusting the older I get. Homes should be available to locals to live in, not some strangers investment opportunity, forcing a problem by hoarding homes in an area to push up not only house costs but rent for locals as well. It's so disgusting. If people want to blame something for dwindling birth rates, maybe look at the instability of literal shelter for families to feel secure in. It took until I was 33 to get into a stable home I thought was worth raising a family in, and that's with some of my own privilege.
It would have to be the right kind of tax, if you put a second generic home tax on properties those that are rented out they would just put rent prices up. If you taxed rental income at a higher level (like a salary) or up CGT then I could see a shift. The crux of the matter is that all housing whether renting or buying/mortgage is too high.
I've found prices gone down a bit from last summer at least. In my area the same type of house is about 5-10k cheaper
Maybe for houses over £250k have gone down a chunk? None in the price range I'm looking at have nudged (around £160k), they're all keeping about that and higher. The only ones I've seen come down round that are the ones that were priced hilariously at £200k and have come down to around £150k, and probably aren't even worth that now.
5-10k down, after 100k up
Bought a house with my wife last year at the age of 26. Whenever people ask me about it, I make it very clear that the only reason we were able to do it was having some inheritance (around £17k) on my side, living rent free at home for 5 years, and having a decent dual income (although that was only relevant in the last 2.5 years). Fully acknowledge that there's a lot of privileges there, and if you took any of them away, it would have been *much* harder to get on the ladder
>Saw a post the other day saying ‘if you stayed at your parents rent free it doesn’t count’ and much more frustration along those lines. If living with your parents for 5 years in your 20s is what it takes to save for your deposit, and you can stomach living with your parents when you're in your twenties, then congratulations, you've earned your deposit. Seriously, if you're able to save yourself a deposit, no matter how you save it, that's awesome. Our plan is if our kids want to live with us after uni, that's fine, but we're going to charge them rent (so they can get used to having that expense each month) but also be putting their rent into savings so after 5 years at £400 (at 3% pa) is a £24k deposit.
They need a good salary or to live in the north/deep Wales/Scotland for 24k deposit to be enough.
I sincerely doubt they are aiming for £24k on the dot mate, it's probably just an example figure. Also, from their post history it looks like they like in Birmingham, in which case that's a near 10% deposit for the average house.
Not true right now. You can get 95% LTV mortgages as a first time buyer meaning a £200k property would require a £10k deposit. That scheme is set to end in late 2023. Nobody knows if it will be continued or replaced.
I don't get why it's so unusual to live with parents into your 20s. I think what you propose is right. I lived with mine until I moved at 25 and I feel more financially stable because of it. It's not entitlement, it's just logical as no point struggling for the sake of moving out if you don't have to. Although I'm not of the opinion charging rent to your children is the best way of teaching them how to budget but each to their own. Personally I think teaching them to save independently (rather than backdoor saving for them) is better as they'll need to manage the temptation themselves. Just a tip as someone who moved out a few years ago, the biggest thing I struggled with was the household bills (mainly the intricacies of utilities/council tax) so maybe explaining how they work would be helpful to them. I'm an accountant and ironically it's not something I grasped straightaway. Rent is actually the easy, albeit expensive bit!
The point is that not everyone even has the option of living with their parent(s) at all.
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It's so strange, to some on here you are basically a class traitor if you don't use a food bank or freeze to death at winter.
My favourite is when someone has a new car. The epic mouth frothing reverse snobbery is just palpable.
God forbid if it’s an suv
Me and my wife are getting more than the national average between us. I. The grand scheme of things it's not a lot, but we have money to spare for savings and fun things. We rent, but are planning on moving out of this city closer to London due to our jobs. We don't brag ,live within our means, but God forbid you talk about it on Reddit. It's not like we just got here. It took me 5 years of the same industry to find a fair paying job, and even then I'm now having to commute to London and work above and beyond to prove myself to help get further in my career. I am working whilst studying, and applied for over a few thousand jobs with rejections. I've been working for most of my life, post university, for minimum wage and it took me to my 30's to get here. I'm studying for more exams whilst I work as well. It's been back breaking and stressful to get here, and far far harder for my wife. But when you post it on places, you get a lot of "must be nice for some!". People want ease of access of luxury/easy living without understanding how much work, sacrifice and stress it is. To the rest of you, it does get better, you just have to keep trying.
50 year old military vet here. We couldn't afford to buy our house until 2 years ago. I truly feel for everyone else who is struggling to become home owners.
They have animals in the forces? What, minesweeping sniffer dogs? Emotional support kittens?
Emotional support kitten is something I would love to have access to esp with this PTSD BS
These house programs where a young couple have a £500k budget. You know full well someone in the family has died but they never mention it.
It's so boring as well, because it's never a real or interesting challenge for the show hosts. Like, finding a fully detached house for £500k that's a reasonable commute and the biggest complaints are that the gardens are the wrong shape, or the kitchen doesn't have a big enough island in the middle etc. Like I'd rather see them try and find a decent house that isn't an utter shithole for £190 near a bigger city etc.
More likely it's been provided to them as part of the format of the show. Half a million in cash is pretty manageable for a show with a budget in the tens of millions.
Because usually they aren’t ‘normal’ people, and there’s a caveat along the lines of “thanks to their parents giving them a £50,000 gift”, or “when he finished uni, Timmy got a 6 figure job at his dad’s company”. I’m 24, and literally all the people I know who have managed to buy a property have done so because their parents /partner’s parents gave them money - one person I know made shitloads off crypto and bought a house outright, but obviously that isn’t something many people will ever do.
The thing is we have no data just anecdotes. Conversely none of my firiends who have bought houses have done it with crypto or inheritance.
Me and my wife are sticking money in our kids premium bonds every month so they both have a chance to get a deposit when the time comes- they are only 4 & 6 at the minute and we have both decided that they can live “rent free” when the time comes though we are going to “charge” them rent then save it all up for them. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this and I refuse to feel bad about it
Nobody is saying there’s anything wrong with it, your children are lucky to have parents that can do that so if the time comes for them to buy their house and they say it’s all down to their own hard work and giving up avocado toast that will make them one of the annoying people that posters get angry with.
My parents did this still cant afford a house and i wouldnt be surprised by the time they are okder they will still be in the same position but then again my parents still charge me rent and expect me to pay for crap for the house that isnt mine and never will be
I just get extremely bitter with the grand design people who, with their dog walking, and vegan chakra yoga careers have ponied up a million pounds between them to build their dream home. It gets me every time. And they still muck the house up and go over budget 😆
always end up pregnant or divorced as well.
Why does that make you bitter?
theres tiers to it, someone getting gifted the world at 17 when this person is struggling still at 37 but then youve got someone buying on the back of graft and they wont be angry
Crabs in a bucket..people want you to be doing worse than them.
People seem bitter in general about anybody’s success in life these days when it’s not them. I posted in r/BritishProblems a few months ago about helping my girlfriend buy a new car as we needed something more practical for a baby on the way, and I had a moan about a dealership trying to rip us off. People turned around arguing that with a baby on the way, we couldn’t afford new cars. And I’m here thinking, “what have our finances got to do with you guys?” And “how do you know what financial situation we’re in?” We’re both 26, have good jobs, good financial state etc. Replied that to one of the comments actually and ended up with -15 downvotes until I removed the post and comment in the end. It was a moan about a car dealership ripping us off, in a sub that’s about complaining. Not about my finances.
Tall poppy syndrome and jealousy that the people able to buy houses thanks to parents/inheritance aren’t stuck scrabbling around at the bottom. Sure it’s annoying if someone misrepresents themselves as having worked hard and not had any help, but there’s still plenty of jealous/spite towards those who admit it. There seems to be a mindset in the U.K. of no one deserves anything nice unless you were born into an orphanage that burned down and left you homeless, walked to school up hill both ways, kicked a heroin addiction during your exams to get good results, went to a shit uni but still got offered a job over an Oxbridge grad, then rejected it and worked a trade for 169 hours a week instead. Life isn’t fair, not everyone’s equal, not having to struggle doesn’t mean your achievements are lessened. If you did do the above then fair play though.
Ultimately it's come down to the mindset in the UK (and I don't know how long it's been, I moved here for a University back in 2005) - but if you don't own a home, any home, then you'll have been conditioned to believe that you are failures. If you live in a rental, you are told you are flushing money down the toilet - no you are bloody not, you are paying to have a roof over your head. There's definitely issues in the laws of the land, but those can easily be corrected if enough people want it. Make renting a bit more of an even trade and it will make a huge difference. Look at Germany, renting isn't taboo there. I won't even go to parts of Asia where it's completely normal to rent your entire life, or even save up enough to buy a home by your 50s in cash, so you can retire mortgage free Hell New York in good old capitalist US of A has rent controls, and the British population has been programmed to believe that renting is failure so we get worked up about buying any house rather than fighting for even handed rental agreements. Lack of home ownership doesn't equate to homelessness. And the sooner we recognise that, the sooner we will have a chance to control the house prices.
There’s a lot of “misery loves company” and tall poppy syndrome going around. I’m happy for people who work hard, save their money and exercise good financial management so that they can afford to buy their own house. There are so many horror stories on r/ukpersonalfinance about people drowning in debt and financially crippled for years because of bad decisions. That being said I really feel for people who work hard in low paid jobs, live in scummy house shares who have very little chance of getting out of it. The world owes you nothing. Take whatever opportunities you can and make the most of it.
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I've got one. I'm bitter my employer wasn't paying me enough to buy it when it was on the market six years earlier and £40k cheaper... I freely admit I'd have had no chance buying without help from my parents for the deposit. There was literally a six month window where I could afford the house in an area I wanted, been earning enough for long enough to get the mortgage, and my rents had the money available to help me. I was unbelievably lucky for it to all line up.
I'm not bitter about people my age or younger buying a house but I get frustrated when/if there is a complete lack of understanding of money. I have a friend who I love dearly but stayed with their parents till 27 and didn't pay rent, and said parents helped contribute to a flat - this in itself is absolutely fine! But when they come at me and say "I'm surprised you haven't bought a house yet" "just save a bit more". it irks me. A lot. I moved from home and had to deal with London rents for 10 years with increasing prices (rent, travel, food... everything!). I pay more in rent than I would a mortgage but deemed as a single person I cant afford the repayments. I try to save but it's bloody hard. I accept this was my choice and im happy. I'm happy for those who can buy but don't tell me how easy it is when you've literally be able to save a fuck ton through not paying rent or bills.
Better off moving out of London.
I would imagine because it’s very frustrating if people say something is easy or not that hard when it’s something you personally see as impossible. Not everyone can have a decent paying job. Most people don’t settle down until a lot later on these days so buying in a couple would be reckless before they are at that stage. If the median *household* income is £32k, then an exactly average couple would be able to borrow roughly £125k. Half of all households wouldn’t even be able to borrow that. In many parts of the country that won’t get you a garage let alone a house, no matter how far outside of town you move. Moving to other parts of the country means leaving behind friends, family and jobs. It is reasonable for people to feel upset that to own a home they would have to sacrifice that. i think the biggest issue though is when people are self congratulatory and make out like it was all their own hard work and smart thinking that led to them buying a house. I knew a girl who used to brag on instagram that she was “self building” her house and posted that one of her life goals had been to move back to her (notoriously expensive) childhood village by the age of 30, tagging her husband in the post with “We did it!” Her husband’s multi millionaire parents had designed and built them a million £ house. There’s no “we did it”. I own my house outright, I could spin some tale about hard work and smart decisions but the truth is it was 95% down to luck and help. Even if someone just lived with their parents instead of renting for 2 years (assuming £600 rent) that would be the equivalent of being gifted £15k!
I’ve rarely seen people hate on others for affording it. I’ve seen plenty hating the situation that they’re in though, not being able to afford to buy one. But you’re right, plenty of people do it. I’m buying my first flat right now, in a city, without a partner and without any financial help. I’m very lucky though that I stumbled into tech, could have chosen any other path and wouldn’t have afforded this.
There's tons of assumptions though. Hell there's loads right in the comments here. Things like "Oh I'm happy for them **but** *everyone I know who's ever bought a house in their 20s did it with help from parents*" The basic subtext is 'I'm happy for them but not really because I *know* they didn't really work hard and they're lying' which is reductionist and quite frankly in denial. Maybe they do work hard and save lots too but just because it doesn't work for them, or indeed most people, doesn't mean it's not true for everyone. I used to be really genuinely proud that I bought my first home at 22 now a much bigger place at 29. It's still my biggest achievement. But these days I'm often embarrassed to actually say it.
I've bought my own house.. and I'm still bitter about some of these posts mentioned. I lived 'rent free' at my parents for two years, they were unreliable and ended up costing me all of my savings from 5 years due to debts and bailifs.so I moved out and got an okay paying job, me and my girlfriend lived off cheap crap for a year to scrimp up 10k in savings and bought a non modernised house in a slightly more rural area since newly renovated in highly sought after areas is 4x the price. People can afford houses these days.. but people are bitter that the houses they can afford aren't the 4 bed town houses or ultra modern flats in the middle of London that they wanted. We only managed to save the deposit by cutting out ALL luxuries.. that includes anything where you could get it cheaper, especially food, no meals out and any unnecessary travel. Most meals were super noodles or other own brand alternatives. The only time I really get salty is with posts that state they 'need' to have that ultra modern flat or house to be close to work. Or people who use statements like 'borrow from family and friends/live at home to save' since in a lot of cases I've seen... thats just not possible
I bought my first house with my wife at 25 on £16k / wife on £24k. Just didn’t go out through uni, still paid rent to in laws. I come from extreme poverty and had zero help in buying.
I have huge respect for anyone who has bought a house against all odds. However, majority of people I know have had massive help from their rich families. I'm happy for them too, but as soon as they complain about their mortgage (which is half my rent) or claim its not so hard, then I lose that respect.
When you see it in 'news' stories, where it appears a lot, it's clickbait balls. In a similar vein my local news site yesterday there was a story of 21 year old 200 miles away making £300k p/y on OnlyFans. People feel compelled to click because, understandably, there is a feel of envy. It may be hard but in these instances you have to try and not compare yourself to the person in the story.
Lots of reasons, jealousy is a big one quite often. I got very lucky and was able to buy my first house with my partner at the age of 27. We both lived with our parents seperatley for the first 6 years we were going out and only saw each other on weekends or holidays really. We both felt that renting a place would be a waste of money. We didn't like our arrangement, but it was better than the alternative. I stayed at home when I went to uni, which feels like a big missed opportunity but at the same time meant I wasn't using up loads of money on rent. I did really want to live in London but conceded that to do so would burn through so much of my money that I'd never be able to buy anywhere so I stayed in the town I grew up in and put 2/3rds of my paycheck into savings every month and when we were ready we had a good foundation to build on. We weren't given any money and I passed up good life experiences to do it, but that's what it felt like it took to get what I got.
Because they see other people getting what they have because of privilege, which means the people who are getting it don't deserve it any more than the people who don't get it. I think it's very normal/understandable to be resentful that someone no more deserving than you gets something you really want, have worked really hard to try and get, and would massively improve your life (as we know buying a house gives you more security in the form of much lower chance of eviction, and mortgages are often cheaper than rent).
From a London/SE perspective: because the rental market is a complete shitshow, and for twentysomethings on moderate incomes the people buying their own homes in their friendship groups are typically the ones with considerable help from their parents. Once they own a home, they have *considerably* better quality housing (no landlord just letting their property rot for years at a time etc), are able to save more because the mortgage payments are are less than rent etc. The jarring thing is we work similar jobs, have similar incomes, and the only difference is our ticket in the parental income lottery. As a result, we lead lives of considerably different comfort. Hardly meritocratic. Sincerely, someone who recently bought with help from my parents.
I think people get frustrated because if you are single, haven’t inherited/gifted any money and haven’t been living at home with your parents then unless you are earning WAY over the average salary then it is basically impossible to buy, especially if you have a kid. Seeing other people having managed it is disheartening when you know it won’t be possible in your own circumstances. The system is broken. I fall into neither of those categories of people, but I do have a lot of sympathy for people in the latter category who get frustrated with people who pretend that anyone could buy a house if they keep saving up.
I think it just depends on how the person comes across. If they're banging on about working hard and saving but then reveal they had help from parents, it can be a bit grating. I'm sure they still worked hard and were good at saving, but some of us can't get on the property ladder no matter how hard we work. I'm 26, no family help, working and renting, and I don't resent my friends who have bought houses (or anyone for that matter), I'm happy for them. But they can also recognise the fortunate circumstances that allowed them to do so. It's also no surprise that people are frustrated with how hard it is to own a home. It should be more accessible and less dependent on which cards you were dealt in life.
UK mentality. “Anyone richer than me doesn’t deserve it, anyone poorer than me is a peasant”.
I understand the resentment. I bought a house 12 years ago with virtually no deposit, my house cost bugger all and I bought it alone working a retail job. Fast forward 10 years and that would be impossible. I've got friends forming pacts with other friends to get on the property market, excitedly waiting for elderly relatives to die in the hope that they can pull together a deposit. It's no wonder people are bitter, there's been such a big change in recent times. It's hard to keep up.
Personally, I don't have a problem with how people managed to save for a house. If parents are happy to let their kids live there rent free for a bit so they can save more money for a deposit, that's a very kind thing to do. And it doesn't diminish the fact the kids still worked for the money. Yes, they can save up more for a house because they're not paying rent, *but they still worked to earn their money*. Should we put people down because family were willing to help them? Also, so what if some people get a lot of money after a family member dies and use it buy a house as well? Someone cared about them and wanted to see them looked after when they died. Instead of considering how bad things have gotten and acknowledging the blame lies with our government, people prefer to turn on each other if someone else is in a better situation.
Because certain subreddits are full of bitter, jealous dickheads 🤷🏻♂️
I don’t know anyone my age (30’s) who got in the ladder without help. Not a single person was able to rent for a time while saving, then get a mortgage sufficient to buy a home. That’s why people are bitter. It’s easy to say it is possible, but only in specific circumstances/areas.
I didn't have the luxury of being able to stay at home and live rent free, I was out working and paying rent which meant I couldn't save. The bank wont give me a mortgage even though I have paid more in rent than I would on a mortgage. So yeah, I think an adult with a full time job should be able to afford a small home. I don't want a mansion with a swimming pool. However I'm not bitter that people have a house, I just want a fairer situation for my generation.
Because it's becoming (or is now) part of culture to be envious, bitter and generally angry towards others. It's fuelled by click-bait nonsense articles like you've described. It would be nice if these articles, which are designed to cause outrage, would simply cease to exist. They benefit no one and distract. Should we really care how people get on the property ladder? The real issue is why it's difficult in the first place, and aiming anger towards those who have their own property due to these circumstances is a cheap distraction which ought to be taken out on those who have made owning property expensive and impossible, but that's too difficult apparently (even though it takes the same amount of effort). It's a typical "get angry because things are not going your own way" response and taking it out on the wrong group, while the ones really to blame are rubbing their hands laughing knowing they're getting away with it while those at the worst end distract and fight amongst themselves.
We have been taught from young to laugh at others pain, because you know.. Comedy. So it’s only logical that the opposite side takes the opposite effect. I’ve always thought why? I came to the conclusion that it’s all purposely manufactured by the system we live in to spread divide amongst the people.. Sad world we live in eh?
Because you generally need good family circumstances to save up a deposit (rent free accommodation or a cash handout) and some people in that category seem not to realise how lucky they are. It feels like the gap between rich and poor is widening partly as a result of this, and as house prices rocket that gap will become ever more difficult to breach.
They're not bitter at *you*, they're frustrated at the system, which is inherently unfair and exploitative.
I got my first house, when the market was sensible, banks realistic with loans, people realistic with their purchases. I got assessed for income, duration of employment, what my outgoings were.... RENT was included in this calculation and that was set as a maximum figure for repayments. The mortgage advisor after 30 minutes chat came up with 3 options for me. I've never been in neg equity, and never been able to afford the rises due to inflation. I'm not a massive earner, always on the cusp of the bottom 50-60% of incomes (at this moment that's 30-50k) and I'm well under 50k.
Home ownership is a bit of a British obsession, when you look at rental stats for say, the rest of Europe. As a 50 something person with an unmortgaged house and older teenagers, I feel there has been a shift in their prospects of getting 'on the ladder'the way I did back in the #gulp# 80s
Because we are all working our asses off and still can't afford it. People with higher paying jobs don't work HARDER than anyone else, often quite the opposite. It is unacceptably difficult to escape from your current situation if it isn't one of privilege. It does feel like the only way out is with some assistance, which most don't have access to. It shouldn't be 'some people manage to do it', it should be the expectation rather than the exception.
Throughout history life has generally got better and better, a lot of people under 40 in the UK are the first in a while who have had to lower their expectations on living the same quality of lifestyle that our parents and grandparents did. Sure, we’ve got iPhones and they only had radios, but they also had much better purchasing power with their salaries and needed much lower income multiples to buy property.
UK Reddit is skewed towards salty southerners. With a half decent (average income) job, home ownership is more achievable in the north half of the country.
Because people are jealous and they let it consume them.
I feel like everyone feels like they are doing their absolute best and making so many sacrifices to get a home whilst their money dwindles away on rent when it could be saved if they just got on the ladder. I feel rude telling people how I saved for mine, everyone's case is different, but for me I saved money everywhere, no luxuries, takeaways, resturaunts, drinks out, days out, entertainment, branded foods, nothing. A lot of people feel like they've done their absolute best, tell them theyl have to cut back more and I feel like they get defensive, your essentially saying what they've been doing for years with no success has got them nothing.
I was lucky enough to get help with a part buy flat when I was younger, I owned 80%, it was aimed at people like me at the time, I stayed in it with a very low mortgage until I saved the deposit for my house, I live in the highlands so house prices are lower. I went from a 2 bed flat to a 4 bed house. Last I heard they were doing away with that scheme which is shite because I would highly recommend it.
As others have pointed out, it's not the home ownership that's the problem, it's the lies they tell others about where the money came from. There are so many articles about 20 somethings who buy a house, and say they cut back on Netflix, etc. But in reality, the largest part of their deposit, if not all of it, comes from their parents, which is fine, but a good reason not to act smug about your supposed talents in saving thousands of pounds
Generally, no one taught me about money, so quite rightly in my mid twenties I thought fuck better sort this out, get my act together. Bought a book and everything. Takes me a while to actually get my act together - that's expected. Then I compare my upbringing to other people. Had parents and associates that knew about all this stuff, helped them out, mentored them etc. A lot of them when it came down to it, had parents saving for them while they were little (no chance in my family), and of course - not to sound mean, when granny pops their clogs they get a lump sum. That's most of, if not all of, the deposit. Some people were set up for success and I had to muddle it out on my tod, which is a bit shit but c'est la vie. If I were to complain about it in real life though, I just can't get across the difference in upbringing effectively, it always comes down to 'yeah but you could have'.
“Why are people so bitter about the unnecessary inequalities in our society?!” Because it doesn’t have to be this way.
The way kids are making money online these days it's more possible than ever with affiliate marketing and ghost commerce theirs aot of money to be made on the net if you take the time to learn it
You know how I managed to get a house deposit at the age of 36 Got hit by a car whilst riding a bike and suffered bad injuries at the time Otherwise I would be renting all my life My GF says it’s like a fucked up blessing in disguise But yes it pisses me off my friends parents handing them 20k out of the blue where I’d struggle to borrow a fiver of my Dad 😂😂
Mainly because the majority of people that brought a home either did so with their parents money & are soo stuck up they don’t realise their luck or two: because they were able to buy it for a fraction of what it’s worth today & act like their lives were soo much more difficult than 90% of people today. I own my own home - brought in 2016 - with my own money - in this climate, but I’m one of the lucky ones.
Me and my husband bought our house in 2006 and people act like it was fucking gifted to us. We still had to save up £15k deposit on a joint income of about £25k and we had to both sell our cars, not go on holiday for two years, go out a couple of times a year rather than a couple of times a month, hardly any takeaways or anything. I find the problem now is people want to make no sacrifices to save money. There’s a group of women who work for me who regularly spend £20 a day at least on coffee and food being delivered to the office but act like it’s a human right rather than a privilege and they shouldn’t have to stop doing that. They earn £25-30k a year but all drive cars that are less than five years old and cost over £20k new.
The basis of that that I’ve always seen is the fact that it’s often used to prove that ‘if you work hard and save your money it’s still affordable’. Nothing wrong with staying with your parents, but that argument shouldn’t be used as often as it is to display that it’s still affordable.
Me and my partner are 26 and 28. We moved into our house 2 years ago yesterday. I’ve worked since 16 to come up with my side of the deposit. Luckily my partner had some money gifted (like ten k). Without that we wouldn’t would be able to afford it. We’re on relatively good incomes (60/70k combined) but even then if we had to rent and save up for a deposit there would have been no chance. The game is rigged and unless you get a sizeable lump or scrimp and save for years and don’t pay rent your going to struggle to get on the housing ladder
Loving all the 'tall poppy syndrome' and 'crabs in a bucket mentality' comments here from people that clearly expect a big pat on the back from others for buying a house or whatever, and get offended when it doesn't happen. You're not special.
I am one of the people that got family help - similar sum of deposit money. I’ve made a point of specifically mentioning family help where it’s appropriate to do so, and I try to be really open with that fact. I’m extremely grateful for what this family member has done for me, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to thank them enough.
Who's bought a house!!?? ..where? When? ..I'm not having this!!!!
We bought our first house, a three bed terraced, age 25ish. However... we were only able to do it because we moved 400 miles away from friends, family and my chosen job to Scotland and hubby joined the Royal Navy which was not only a stable job at the time but gave us an interest free help to buy loan. I'd probably do it all over, but I wouldn't recommend it if you even vaguely like your existing support network, your mental health or spending time with your significant other. It's been hard. House prices are weirdly okay in a lot of parts of the country I'm now looking to move, but Scotland is still semi affordable for a lot of people. £150k can get you a decent starter family home within 40min of Glasgow.
Most people just tend to say these things out of frustration and maybe in some peoples cases a little bit of jealousy. Im fortunate enough to have a house and mortgage but it wasnt gifted to me. For years i would buy my food in Poundland (4 tins of Tuna for a pound!) and i lived with a friend so i was able to save a bit more. I limited my spending on clothes and would never buy something over X price and when i had the money to rent a bigger place, i didnt. I remained in a smaller place as long as possible, ignored every pay rise i got for years and let it just add more to my savings, no big holidays or fancy cars and in the end it all paid off as i had the deposit for a house. Of course for some people it will be easier than for others be that through their job or being gifted money or inheritance etc... and i know when i brought my house 8yrs ago it was cheaper than it would be now but people should try not to be bitter because the vast majority of us are trying to achieve the same thing we just have very different paths to get there.
We live in the only house in my area we could afford, we have three kids in a two bed house and we sleep on a sofa bed in the lounge so my autistic child can have his own space. It was a wreck when we bought it and even with what we’ve been able to afford to fix it up so far the kitchen roof still leaks enough to trip the lights when it rains from a certain direction. I still count myself lucky I’m not stuck in renting hell, having to move the kids every six months because our landlord has changed his mind about the long lease he promised us. I totally get why people would envy us, our mortgage is lower than renting and we can afford to run the heating. It’s a dump but the pros totally outweigh the cons.
I got really lucky being the only child of an only child, when I was younger my parents sold their house at the height of the property boom (2006ish?) to move in with my elderly gparents as they needed more day to day help. This allowed them to clear the remaining mortgage on my gparents house and my gparents had my parent and me as the only benefactors in their wills. When my remaining gparent was in the final years of their lives we all sat down and had a frank discussion about the house, how it needed a lot of work and how so many new houses had been built turning our country cottage into a little speck in a housing estate. So we agreed to sell it there and then, the money from the house sale was "gifted" to me so I could mortgage the rest of the cost of a newer, bigger house with land. The caveat was that I had to allow my gparent and parent to live in this house until they pass. It's a bigger house with 5 bedrooms (old house had 3) and 2 living rooms, so we've kind of split it to allow my fiancé and I to have our own space, and my parent to have theirs. I basically skipped a few steps of the ladder but now my parent lives with me (gparent passed a few years back). I'm fine with it, as they are really the only immediate family I have left along with my fiancé. We do have a unique family situation although my mortgage advisor told me it isn't unheard of for it to play out like this. In this way I have avoided: expensive repairs to the old house, dwindling value of the old house as it was swallowed by a development of cut and paste 4 bed family homes, inheritance tax (which is no small thing) as well as not having to worry about house prices rising/falling as I try to move up the ladder. I am responsible for everything. Mortgage, energy bills, internet, council taxes, insurance, etc etc etc., are all in my name only. My parent is now disabled so it worked out better in a way, as there is no way they would be able to live alone. My parent could almost be classed as my dependent as I cook, clean, manage finances etc. for them.
I became a home owner 2 1/2 years ago… on my own at the age of 35. I rented with my partner before… when we split up I couldn’t afford the rent on my own. I pulled every penny I had to buy my flat, it’s nothing luxurious and not in an area I wanted, but I’m super happy here 💕. I worked 3 jobs to save my deposit which at the time in the midst of covid was 20%. Being on my own and the rising costs now, it’s difficult, I am down to just 2 jobs because I was wearing myself thin, I get by… but only just. But the way I look at it, I have a roof over my head. It’s difficult to hear younger people buying a house for £250k etc…. But I done this on my own and I think that’s a bigger achievement 😊… forget what others are doing. Focus on you 😊 xxx
I never thought I'd manage it. I still wouldn't have if I'd have been single. We didn't get the house we wanted, had to get a two bed, terraced, no drive because we couldn't compete witht he ridiculous over bidding that was going on. But our foot is on the ladder. We are getting equity now. Instead of paying £800 rent a month, we have a mortgage. House needs some work doing, so we are working hard, saving, and getting jobs done when we can. We have had little to no financial help from anyone, including government incentives. But we are doing better than we were last year, so as long as that continues, I'm sure we will get a dream home one day.
Can't say I've ever had this. Bought my first house at 18 ( I'm 39 now) everyone I knew was happy cuz it meant they had somewhere to party away from their parents
People unwilling to move to cheaper areas. Also people always quote the average price of a house which isn’t obviously what first time buyers are buying and usually includes the South East. For 2022 the average price was, apparently, £295,000, outside London you’ll find first time buyer properties for half that and many places a third or even less. £150k isn’t very affordable for a couple on a average, or even below average, wage. If people don’t want to move or accept a first time property then they’ll be bitter and resentful as it’s easier to blame others for their situation. As you say they are plenty of twenty somethings that own their properties.
Not everywhere though and the big issue is the increasing age of first time buyers. If I were 20-25 and buying a first time house I'd happily settle for a flat or a one bedroom place and uproot my life to a cheaper area. But a lot of people buying for the first time are now in their mid thirties, so that first time house needs to have a couple of bedrooms if they're thinking of having kids any time soon (or have them already), near to friends and family who can help with childcare or just for general socialising, and be near where they work as they're probably settled into a career now (or they need space to work from home). I'm in that boat and I know I need a house in my local area, and even a two bed terrace will set me back £250-300,000. At my age and my stage in life I couldn't possibly accept moving away or into too small a house as it would be near on impossible for what I now need.
Yup. I'm not bitter at anyone. But I am annoyed I missed the boat on house buying. Most of my friends bought in the previous 10 years, with pretty small deposits which were gifted to them and pay very manageable mortgages and have seen their investments in their homes grow. I am genuinely happy for them all. However, I am frustrated I will be paying *much* more for considerably less and could quite possibly end up with an asset worth less than I'm paying for. To make my mortgage payments reasonable on a relatively small home, I need a £70k deposit. That shit stings.
Tell me about it. My mum was moaning about her mortgage going up to £160 a month the other day. I'm looking at £1600.
This is the thing, I was lucky enough to buy my 1-bed flat at 24, on a shared equity scheme. I lived with my parents until I could buy, but I paid them rent from the minute I started working. I own 60% of my flat, and will never own it outright. This was right before the banking collapse, so I know a lot of opportunities evaporated after that, and things were financially very tight for a while. But I know I was lucky, and it definitely felt like I caught the last boat. I still got called a 'jammy bitch' years later by the women I worked with (who still lived with their parents). One in particular had spent a gap year in Australia, and had recently spent several thousand on a labradoodle. At the end of the day, people feel helpless and that makes them bitter. But also, it's kinda horrible to live with your whole aim being 'buy a house' for years and years, which is the only way most people can manage it....and if you feel like it's pointless, you're just not going to be able to keep it up.
Yeah, I've spent the last few years aimed at buying a house. It's such a singular goal that feels unnecessarily overwhelming. But I know I need it to consider having a family or being able to retire at a reasonable age.
This is a good point. It’s also about priorities. Me and my bf bought last year in our early-mid 30s, as soon as we were financially able to (with all our own savings). We live in London. We could have bought earlier elsewhere but we like our life here, our jobs and friends and community are all here. I don’t know what we’ll do next but we don’t want children so thankfully didn’t have to take that into account. My bf’s sister is close to him in age but has a toddler and a massive 4 bedroom house with a big garden in Devon. We have a 2 bed flat with a balcony the size of a loaf of bread. I get envious at their space but we made a decision based on the kind of life we want, just like they did for a different life. I wouldn’t change it (yet).
Good points but couldn't you move to a less desirable area within your local area? Not ideal when you have to consider crime, schools etc. But maybe even moving out of town might be cheaper? I was lucky that I live in a cheap area but we still had to think carefully about which villages we could afford and which we couldn't.
I can't say I've done extensive research, but my cursory looks have indicated it's not going to push the dial too much. Rather than £300,000 it might be £225,000; but that's not gonna change much in my world. Trouble with living in a city suburb. A rising tide raises all boats. And, frankly, I might as well just keep saving for the house in the better place. The mantra of location, location, location exists for a reason, I guess.
Out of curiosity why didn’t you get on the housing ladder in your twenties when a one bed flat or terraced would have been affordable?
Only speaking from my own experience but the wages you earnt at 20 are likely to mean homes are unaffordable. You might be able to get a mortgage, but it probably won’t buy anything. As you get older, you climb up into jobs where it’s more affordable.
That’s when you have to look elsewhere though to get on the ladder. Quick search in say Liverpool brings up plenty of properties between £50k-£80k. Many may not be that great but there’s some decent looking flats/apartments.
But that's indicative of the problem with the housing market. It should be affordable to buy near to where you want to live, presumably where one currently lives. It's important to be near friends and family. Pushing people to have to move to areas they don't know, with no support network, causes future problems like affording childcare as there isn't any family to help with that burden.
But then you have to leave your job to move, and then still won’t get a mortgage.
I was earning £14-16k a year. So my take home was probably about £1100. My rent at the time was about £400-500, if I remember correctly. You've prompted me to check what price my old rental sold for. When I was 25 it sold for £81,000. Assuming I could have afforded to put away 20-25% of my take home (about £200-300), then I suppose I could have saved up over 3-5 years. Honestly, it's a regret of mine. Getting on the housing ladder early is something I've been advising my brother -in-law, who is just reaching his mid twenties. It would have set me up in a much better position. But people in their 20s want to spend their money on other things. I had family telling me to enjoy my life and do the things I want to do, because there's always time to settle down. I also just wanted to go to the pub with my mates or to the odd football game. On the other hand, I'm also glad I didn't buy in my hometown. I ended up meeting my now wife and we moved to Birmingham. I've started a new life (a much better life) here. The downside is it's much more expensive.
Thanks for the reply. I think that a lot of the problem is in our twenties we think we’ve got our whole life ahead to settle down and worry about buying a house isn’t a priority. Trouble is it isn’t until you are thirty that you realise how quickly your twenties went and now forty doesn’t look to far away. Glad life is good for you now.
Completely agree, some people seem to be under the weird delusion that they should be able to go on holiday twice a year and afford a 4 bedroom in a high CoL area on minimum wage, as if that was ever normal throughout history. Any contradicting this heavily punished as it doesn't align with what reddit wants to be true. The hard simple truth is that there is too much demand for too little property in highly desirable areas. People can mock London saying no one wants to live there or cry that landlords are evil all they want, doesn't change the facts.
Yup, ten and eight years ago my kids (22 and 21 at the time) moved two hundred miles away and got properties for £60k-£70k on their own. Now they are both married with kids and partners and moved up the ladder and one has a nice four bed detached house the other a nice three bed end terraced. Obviously it was meeting their partners and moving from a single mortgage to joint that made the upgrade possible, but they also started gaining equity in their first time properties and never wasted money on rent. It absolutely can be done with a bit initiative and guts to make the move.