To think it’s very hard to live in the uk without inheritance or family money?

@fedupwithbeingcold but this was doable for you in a way that it isn’t now for the younger generation. that’s the point. The home owning middle classes are in decline FACT. Home ownership is in decline - the decrease has been rapid over the last 6 years.

@Pottedpalm what is your definition of a good career? Well paid as the only characteristic? And what do we think those who serve us in care homes, childcare etc deserve? My wonderful sister was a devoted nursery deputy manager, caring for other people’s children all day, doing unpaid work at the weekend and evenings to set up the nursery and make up crafts, prepare for special events. She was earning just above a minimum wage. No chance of home ownership on that salary and yet an essential and worthwhile career.

A lot of people seem to be missing the point.

Why should a couple both have to work in order to have a roof over their heads and have some quality of life, especially when their children involved.

It's baffling that in previous generations you could own a house, have more than 1 child and have the wife at home looking after them. Yes other things were harder- I get that. But it's now the norm for both parents having to work, orherwise they will struggle financially.

To these saying they worked hard, got a degree and saved up. How many of you had the opportunity to save up whilst living rent-free at your parents? Parents bailing you out at uni. Not everyone has that privilege.

Also, life isn't always straight forward. There's redundancies, unplanned pregnancies etc.

It’s tough to be in your 30’s atm.

In the last 10 years interest rates, energy, nursery and food have all shot up but wages haven’t.

I’m a boomer, I lost 9 years pension because Lloyds bank didn’t allow women to join the pension scheme until they were over 25. ( They expected you to have left by then).
My state pension age rose from 60 to 66 with 3 years notice.
Only half my flat rate pay was used to calculate our mortgage allowance.
Sexual inequality was normal and definitely affected women’s careers and wages.
I accept though that if you had a stable marriage you were fortunate.
Without dh I’d be very poor and I always worked part time after dc.

However my sahm friends whose dh’s left when they were 50ish were financially screwed in old age.
No proper work pension, small state pension and little earning power to rebuild their lives.

My dd works 4 days a week since having a dc and I’ve advised her to never give up work.

I came from abroad age 18, and I live pretty well. I'm mid 50s. As soon as I finished university, I bought a flat and made sure I moved jobs regularly to increase my salary. Booked a nursery when I was only 2 months pregnant to ensure I could go back to work with minimum downtime.....

So, it might not be easy but you certainly don't need family money. You need an education and ambition

This is simply not true I know many young people, my own DC included, who are already moving up the property ladder and own ( or will own when mortgage paid) beautiful family homes in their late 30s. None have had inheritances. What they do have is a high level of education and the determination to pursue a good career.

But most ppl would have to wait until they were in their 50’s to inherit the proceeds of their parents home.

Typo - that should say I wouldn’t be able to achieve what I have.

Because that’s capitalism. As soon as you have a tiny bit of capital - eg an inheritance - you can turn that into more capital and borrow money against it. And risk is less so you can borrow money cheap too and have less/cheaper debt at the same time as having the capital! Having your cake and eating it! everything set up to work for you and make you richer.

i believe many of our parents had it slightly easier because the Second World War massively levelled the playing field, there was a massive social will to level up over the 50s, 60s, 70s etc and those repercussions were felt for a while. The aristocracy couldn’t be sustained, stately homes used for hospitals during the war never got going again and were hoovered up by the national trust. But ever since the war we’ve been gradually moving back to the capitalist system of the Victorian times. Capitalism does enable a few people to snowball their money at the expense of everyone else.

I felt the same, OP but I think it’s because I grew up in a time when things were relatively easy and getting better, rather than later, when things became tough. But it was my parents generation that had it relatively easy, for one reason or another, rather than my generation having it especially hard in historical terms.

Post war, there were a lot of societal changes. A lot of young men died, and those left were therefore valued more highly. There was less competition for jobs and pay was better. There was a lot of government investment in housing and the newly introduced NHS. There were also grammar schools and increased social mobility.

So my parents’ generation were able to buy houses at a relatively affordable price. Sounds like you might be twenty years younger than me, but my parents were in the generation when early retirement was the norm and so they’ve had thirty years of retirement, starting at 55 on a good pension (well, Mum worked part time in one of those peanuts jobs you mentioned) and I’m massively envious because I’m going to have to work until I’m 67 and even then won’t necessarily be comfortably off.

But I think the generation before mine had it relatively easy compared to most of history. I think my generation and yours are having to readjust our expectations because what came before wasn’t sustainable. I just wish I’d known when I was young that my generation wouldn’t easily better ourselves, unlike my parents and their parents before them, both of whom saw improvement in their conditions over their lifetime, from council housing to ownership (grandparents) to being very comfortably off (parents).

It definitely used to be easier. My parents both had degrees (both thirds, I think!) and my mum didn't work until I was 10, and after that part-time. My dad worked as a manager in a warehouse and was home before 6 every day. I went to private school from being 4, we had a nice holiday every year abroad (and sometimes one in England too), two cars, and by my age they were close to owning their house (now worth 800k or so) outright. They inherited nothing and owned several properties before our family home, starting in their early 20s.

My husband and I both work long hours and have PhDs in relevant subjects. We had kids late in life. Most of our children's education has been in state schools. We will not be having much of a holiday this year. Our mortgage repayments are insane. We are thinking of getting rid of our single car. We also eat more cheaply than my parents did - much less good quality meat and fish and fewer meals out.

@DustyLee123 this is me too. No help, no inheritance, worked very hard. First part time job was a paper round aged 11 so I could have pocket money and worked since then without a break alongside all my studies. Left my home city in the SE and moved somewhere cheaper to be able to afford a house.

I’m fairly sure that if I had to start again now that I would be able to achieve what I have. Everything is so much more expensive.

You are not being unreasonable, OP. Just because a few people can find example of someone who has managed to defy the odds and get on the housing ladder at a young age doesn’t make you wrong. It is a fact that wealth inequality is rising and has increased exponentially in the last few years. The rich are getting richer and they are the ones who can easily afford assets like housing despite the rising prices. It is only going to get worse. Yes the cost of living has hugely increased but that’s only impacting the layer of society who can no longer afford an ordinary every day life. My mum didn’t work much (then became a cleaner and later a dinner lady) my dad had low average salary. They owned a home despite us a being relatively poor - no holidays, second hand furniture at home that was given to us etc

There are plenty of articles out there which confirm the statistics to show that home ownership is concentrated in the over 65s, more renters than ever before in their 30s and 40s. I can’t find the reference now but I read just yesterday that only 10% of those aged 24-34 owned their own home. Home ownership in 2018 was at around 63% in 2018 and it’s now at 50% - that a significant decline in 6 years.

https://youtube.com/@garyseconomics?si=liEHU0xnl_IRQLGG

I have recently started watching Gary’s Economics - I’d recommend checking it out if you want to uncover the harsh truth about our society and the continued transfer of wealth and widening wealth inequality. I studied a form of economics myself and am pretty well educated but have still had my eyes opened.

Hard work and effort alone are not enough now. It’s appalling really that, despite wanting and needing people to clean our homes, teach our children, nurse our elderly relatives, serve us in shops and cafes, that we also accept that people in these kinds of jobs will struggle to make ends meet, let alone own a home or have a holiday.

on another thread, someone tried to explain these issues away by saying that society has always been unequal and that’s just the way it is. Even if you believe that, right now it’s more unequal than it has been for a long time. That is depressing, frankly and even more so that no one wants to do anything about it.

Wealth inequality and a rise in poverty is also leading to health inequality - we’re seeing widening gaps in healthy life expectancy between those who live in affluent area vs those who live in more deprived areas. The future looks pretty bleak for the ordinary working person right now.

We’ve never had any inheritance, or help with buying a house. We paid for our own wedding. We had no help, other than the very occasional baby sitting , with child care. We’ve studied and worked hard to get well paid jobs.

We saved for longer. Had a baby in a one bed flat for longer than most people would think reasonable because we were saving for a deposit.

Elements of life are harder, but others easier. We are definitely in a cost of living crisis. I think you have to choose a job quite strategically now, and then really work at it.

What kind of jobs did your parents do and what do you do?

What was their income then and what is yours now?

It's the difference between the two that is broadly the measure of social mobility, not inheritance.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/social-mobility-index/overview-the-social-mobility-index

Yes it will feel difficult with one parent not earning as much.

I'm playing the smallest violin...

She would have been able to do it on her own with a couple more years of savings and pay rises though and she’s still have been relatively young to buy.

Not at all a criticism but I’m really interested how they managed it? Are they all on good salaries? DD(23) has just bought a small terrace in the north with a 100k mortgage (max she could get on 27k) 20k savings and 30k from me. She couldn’t have done it on her own. The house is run down and will take years to modernise.

im in my 30s and this is my experience too. I didn’t have a problem buying a house and neither did my friends, we’re all into our next houses now, bigger family ones. My friends younger siblings and my younger work colleagues are now all beginning to buy their first houses. We’re in the south east so not a cheap area. I think it’s always been this way, not everyone can afford to buy but lots of people can. It’s a bit harder currently but still doable for many.

Most people won’t ever have a decent house unless they inherit one. They might be able to stretch to a starter home but thats as far as they’ll ever get. The “housing ladder” only exists if you inherit money.
I'm not convinced. The majority of ds1's(27) friends from school and his colleagues of a similar age own their home (mortgaged obviously)
A lot of Ds2 ( 24)friends are now catching up, including him.

My younger colleagues, ( under 30) own their homes as well.

Level of comfort? How disingenuous of someone like yourself (going by the information about the standards of living you've been fortunate enough to rely on during your life) to make no mention of the vital concept of security. This country now has far too many people working their married or single arses off who can never expect to have the kind of security you and your parents have had

Britons work much harder for much less now - huge change for the worse happened in one generation.

Women work much much harder. Now the fertility rate is falling, which should ease things off, but there won’t be enough DC to keep us going. Whoops, Tories.

Hard work in 🇬🇧 pays less and less in real
terms. People are noticing.

Just this.
I pulled my DM on this when she commented how one of my siblings who is very comfortable financially worked hard for it. I pointed out to her the hours I work and how busy it is at work and hard work doesn't always equate to ££. I was really cross especially when that day I received a huge gas bill I couldn't afford. Its almost like people are suggesting you don't work hard and it is hugely insulting.