All old people should sell up family homes for families.

Well the birth rate hasn't dropped around here

ffs, we are talking statistically!!

This was said to me by a women who has 7 , yes 7 kids !.

Oh in that case yes extrapolate that rare scenario to the entire generation.

It's so depressing how thick some people are.

Mumsnet is skewed towards parents, a vocal minority of whom think that having children is intrinsically meritorious and that someone who has reproduced gains some sort of moral priority over those who have not.

Very true @ImNotReallySpartacus

And inevitably, as soon as they start spouting about their moral priority, they show exactly why they are not meritorious.

I live in a commuter town. Near the station and town centre there are flats (luxury developments and flats above shops) ....the rest of the town is almost all semi detached and detached houses. I can think of a few roads with some bungalows but they are probably a mile away and not many of them. Any new developments are generally 5-10 "executive family homes" with tiny gardens presumably because they are profitable. So moving house becomes leaving the immediate vicinity and community you are part of if you want to downsize to something smaller.

Bungalows are probably the least profitable use of land for houses and I imagine that's why you don't see many new ones being built.
My parents home was in London suburbia - streets and streets of 1930s semi detached houses. There were a few blocks of flats near them but they very rarely came up for sale, and not all had lifts so if stairs were an issue, it might be years before a ground floor flat became available.

Well the birth rate hasn't dropped around here and a lack of bedrooms is definatly not stopping them.
" OMG I cannot believe the council won't give us a bigger house we're not lucky like you, we haven't got the money to ever buy a house "! . This was said to me by a women who has 7 , yes 7 kids !. If I put my house on the market tomorrow this women will never be able to afford to buy it. This is not just about lack of social housing or interest rates or pay rates it is also about shit decision making !

That doesn't sound like down sizing... thats just having less bedrooms (unless you lived in a literal mansion before in which case you still 'downsized' to a massive house).

If the square foot of the house is still massive then its still... well erm massive.

houses with 2 living areas (usually downstairs), 2 bathrooms (usually on two floors), big kitchen diner (usually down stairs), huge hallway (usually downstairs) etc... obviously have far more space upstairs than just 2 bedrooms thats why they are rare. Most people however understand downsizing is more than just counting the rooms with beds in.

Unless you are talking bungalow in which case that would take up a ginormous plot far bigger than a house on this tiny island with limited room for housing.

Ab-so-bloody-lutely.
Sick of trying to find app bungalow that hasn't been snapped up by cash buyers who turn them into family homes.

I don't believe they are obligated to do so.

I think any idea of forcing it is hilarious. Imagine, the logistics of getting these people out of their homes, finding a new one, moving them, dealing with protests. It's great for job creation but bad for the public purse.

Agreed. I have a relative with 5 properties, all owned outright. She rents 2 of them out and flits between the other 3. Ridiculous. I don't think she should be made to sell any of them but they should be very heavily taxed in some way.

Yes. Nobody needs more than 1 house.

How do you view the people that own more than one property

Should they sell them to the younger generation?

My PILs live in a 4 bed detached bungalow they built on DHs grandads land when they got married 50 years ago. Why on earth would they give it up? It's theirs, they've spent their married life in it.

People who hold this view should examine their own life choices and leave the elderly to make their own decisions about their housing situation. If you choose to have more children than you have space for, that is a problem for you to solve, not the elderly couple down the road.

Mumsnet is skewed towards parents, a vocal minority of whom think that having children is intrinsically meritorious and that someone who has reproduced gains some sort of moral priority over those who have not.

This opinion is so horribly ageist!

Beyond a certain point (which varies from person to person) it's actually beneficial to remain in a house you've been in a long time; familiarity of house layout/ items in the home/ local area- less likely to get lost etc and a larger house - more easily accommodates downstairs living, keeping of support equipment, carers can support you more easily.

It's not older people's fault that we don't build suitable accomodation - more bungalows and more 3&4 bed homes.

That’s quite common on mumsnet - the view that people is selfish if they buy a house with a couple of spare bedrooms when a family could be living there. They can fuck off. I’m not living in some miserable beds it just because I don’t have children.

I obviously know it’s a dilemma but when I was young renting was the norm, few people owned their own property in the 50’s and 60’s.
I think buy to rent has caused some of the problems now, fewer properties for sale and snapped up by people building their portfolios 🙄

No

We are mid/late 50s. We are currently in a smallish 4 bed. As soon as youngest dd finishes school (15) we are going to buy a bigger house.
We have adult children and grandkids visit plus we now need an office each. Still years off retirement.
My sil and bil have recently moved in their late 60s/early 70s to a 5 bed town house. They need room for visitors plus enough space not to kill each other!

To downsize, we would have to spend £20-£40k MORE on a 2 bed bungalow that wasn’t a 1970’s wreck than our 3 bed semi. Then there would be conveyancing / moving costs on top.

A 1 bed flat in a nice location would also only be £20k less .

Is anyone any the wiser as to OP’s thoughts on the matter? What a plop and drop merchant 😂

As per previous posters this is ageist. Should younger people living in a 4 bed detached be made to move.
I think government incentives to do so would be great. For example a one time only grant to cover moving costs and no stamp duty on one downsized property etc. The cost of moving would put plenty of people off of downsizing.

Brava @LittleMissUnreasonable !

And also yes! To the poster who points out that smaller homes generally have smaller rooms. The only way I could get the living space size I wanted (and that I pay a lot for!) was to buy a big house.

We need smaller houses with bigger rooms.

Plus if we all stopped having kids when house prices became unaffordable we'd have a massive pension crisis eventually as the workforce would be massively depleted.

we are at this point now, tight labour market, pension age moving out despite no increase in healthy life expectancy, higher stealth taxes.
There are already more over 65s than under 15s & if it wasn't for migration our "natural" population would be declining.

@Kazzyhoward

sorry - I goofed my @ on my last post.

so. For you. 🌻

@gemstoneju I agree. My family, in their 90s, have rapidly deteriorated and are incapable and unsafe to live on their own. Now in a care home and between them costing £100,000 a year. It will use up every penny they have. 'The State' must be thanking their lucky stars that they owned their own home and must also have their metaphirical fingers crossed that they don't live for another 4 years and that 'they' have to take over the burden of costs (although, for all us tax payers, the 'they' is actually us).

For our part, we are glad that their financial position means they can have the best affordable care.