To think it’s unfair that some people get inheritance while others start with nothing?

Me and my DH worked our socks off to be able to buy our property many years ago. Why should we then give it p to the government after we die, we paid our taxes already. Everything we have will going to our DC to make life a little bit easier for them. I'm sorry that some people don't have that leg up but just because they haven't had parents who can help why then deny my DC the help from their parents. Myself and my DH started with nothing, we didn't have the help from parents, but back then it was easier to buy a property. This generation will never be able to buy a property unless they get help from the previous generation.
The idea that everyone starts on the same footing is ridiculous, we are not living in a communist country.

@JoyousGreyOrca Yes. Absolutely: but the Victorians via the London Council and charities started slum clearance and there was the “homes for heros” movement after 1918. They just didn’t meet need and, after ww2, lots of what had been acceptable Victorian houses were deemed slums. It evolved. People moved out to Milton Keynes and other new cities.

Inheritance is not a huge driver of house prices. Many people are quite old before they inherit. The big drivers are lack of building, and land availability. If we built more, prices would be less. However in already very built up areas, there’s a finite supply. It’s easy enough for two people to buy a decent property with both working 1 hour from London. 2 nurses definitely could. Buying alone is a bigger issue regarding affordability and we won’t get back to the 1960s.

This generation will never be able to buy a property unless they get help from the previous generation.

You don't think that might be a problem?

No, my mum was a cleaner and my dad was a warehouse man and I'll inherit close to a million when I eventually do because they worked bloody hard and invested right.

Why should I not have it because you're upset about it?

A friend of ours (now probably late 70s) was an art student in London in the 60s. Her mother (so she told me) urged her to buy one of the terraced Georgian or Queen Anne houses in Peckham, which were then going for a thousand pounds.

She didn’t want to be bothered with buying a house - but within a year prices had doubled to £2k, and she did buy one.
She still has it, probably now worth £1m+.

In early 1930, the average wage in Britain was £1 11s 8d for a week of just over 50 hours, or roughly a shilling an hour.

So that flat cost just under 20 times the average annual wage.

The average annual wage in London is £44,000. So 20 times that is £880,000. That flat in Balham has increased in real terms since early 1930s, but perhaps by not as much as OP thinks.
And if you looked at the average wage for a 50 hour week, the flat probably costs the same now as early 30s in terms of the average wage.

No, my mum was a cleaner and my dad was a warehouse man and I'll inherit close to a million when I eventually do because they worked bloody hard and invested right.

Nothing to do with house price increases then?

@JoyousGreyOrca bought it in the 40s on a policeman's salary.

Sorry 40s not 30s. Surely after the war though?
Was he just a constable, or was he a more senior policeman?

And in 1954 the average house price on London was £1884. So a house costing £2000 in the forties was a more expensive house even then.

It cost 1k not 2k

Yes it was after the war

You said it quickly doubled to £2k

It's over 1m today

You said it quickly doubled to £2k

Not me...

House prices collapsed in 1945 for a brief period.

Was he just a constable, or was he a more senior policeman?

I think constable when they bought but did become a detective at one point. I don't know if police were better paid vs other jobs back then but a policeman isn't buying a 1m property today without significant help.

Balham wasn't really anything much until the 90s when it started changing.

Fair comparisons with the past are difficult but interesting My parents in NE England after WWII put off babies for about 10 years as they needed two full time wages (teacher and NHS doctor) to afford their first house where they lived for over 50 years. I also had to buy with our two full time salaries before we had children in the 1980s as did my children who are married with children. To buy my current house in 1997 we had to use every single penny of savings, didn't even have £1 left, nor any ISA and even used the children's savings but it was worth it and the children's savings were paid back.

My father used almost the last of his life savings other than some NE house equity fro at home dementia care which cost him £130,000 in his last year of life. He died just as the last of the savings were exhausted and as he died quite soon after our mother we had IHT to pay after the fact on our mother's estate on the bit of money we got from her (allowances etc have changed since then). Some older people will be using their house equity and savings for their care in old age.

The biggest IHT issue for people in SE England is that a lot of their life long wealth is in the house. My equity has been taxed at 40%+ already due to my divorce and having had a £1.3m mortgage at one point so it feels a bit unfair that when I die anything over my £325,000 IHT allowance will be taxed again at 40%. So people are sitting there having to work out when they are likely to die. if we abolished IHT things would be easier.

YABU. Most people who've built up enough wealth to pass it on have done so through hard work, determination and good financial planning, or from being an entrepreneur, not from being landed gentry. They've already paid tax on the wealth they've built up and so supported this country. Why on earth should their beneficiaries pay tax again through inheritance? To abolish inheritance is an awful idea. Young people need as much help as they can get. I agree it doesn't seem fair if you don't get any inheritance but to enforce restrictions on those that do is a no-no to me.

My parents had modest jobs (my mum was a dinner lady) but the inheritance I got (nothing like £1m btw) was as much to do with the boom of house prices, as their hard work.

How easy would it be now, for a cleaner and warehouse worker to buy a million pound house? Even if they work really hard?

I’m in my late 50s and started with nothing. I will inherit one day though. My parents started with nothing and they inherited in their 70s. Why is starting with nothing not ok?

It’s such a ridiculous thread, did the op ever return?

unfortunately, the bar is very high right now. That’s something one needs to accept and prepare for it.

How is it unfair? They worked hard for their money. Who should get it then? You? Charity? Government? People work hard for their families and not some random person online who thinks others shouldn't benefit from their family's hard work. Craziest shit I've read so far this year

I would genuinely be interested to know from those who believe that if when you die you have something to leave to your children that it’s logical that it gets taxed and goes to taxman instead of to your kids their reasoning? To address societal imbalances? But if that’s the case then other things needs to be readdressed first… no benefits given to those who have never contributed, no access to NHS to those who again haven’t contributed comes to mind…