Housing Crisis - 5 in a two bed flat

It's neither that unusual, nor that big a deal. I wouldn't describe it as either 'horrendous' or 'utter insanity'.
Poorer people (like me) tend to live in more cramped conditions. It's our lived reality, so we just get on with it.
It may not be what others would choose - or people like me, but I'm bloody grateful to have a safe, warm home to raise my DC in (which I didn't have as a child).
So, we don't need your suppurating snobbery, or judgement.

if a person chooses to have more children than they comfortably have space for then I don’t think they have any right to complain about it.

I’m sure plenty of people are happy with their children sharing bedrooms or to not having any personal space themselves l but I wouldn’t be, so I stopped at two children.

My SIL lives in a three bedroom house.

two adults and seven kids.
they have now got a sofa bed in the living room that the adults sleep on, but they only have two downstairs rooms - the kitchen/diner and the lounge.

it’s a squeeze.

only one bathroom aswell.

Not that unusual. Growing up I shared a bedroom with my two sisters, it held a set of bunk beds and a single bed. My brothers shared another bedroom, parents the third.

One of my colleagues, in her early 20s, has just moved into a shared house. Prior to that she was living in a 2 bed house with her parents and her younger brother. She shared a room.with her brother - he is 3 years younger. They had bunk beds. It happens

Some of it is what you are used to

if you grew up in a smaller home you were not necessarily less happy than friend with bigger homes

but you may be astounded at the expectations of others - room per kid plus a guest room and an office seems like luxury whereas to others it seems a bare minimum

It sounds horrendous to me. I know a woman living in a small two bed flat with her partner and two children...then she had another baby. So now five of them between two bedrooms... utter insanity to me.

It's not unusual. I had 3 kids ( 2 teens and a 5 year old) in a 2 bed flat.

Luckily no partner to squeeze in so the girls shared and the little one was in with me. When the eldest left I moved into biggest bedroom and divided int into 2 with a stud wall to give DS and I a room each.

As for stuff , well we just didn't keep much of it. Always been minimalist anyway but IKEA have some great storage solutions

My friend as a teen lived in a 4 bed maisonette which sounds good but she had 2 sisters, 4 brothers and neice as well as her mum and stepdad.

Parents and youngest brother had a room, 3 brothers in another room with bunks and a single , she and one sister had a room and other sister and niece had obe

Growing up I shared with both my siblings in a smallish double room, I don’t think it’s ‘incredibly cramped’ but it was a squeeze. Other two bedrooms were my parents and my my nan. We had one bathroom/loo. Downstairs was open plan which was difficult as really nowhere I could be alone or have privacy, that was more difficult than storage we had a couple of built in cupboards and a couple of dressers. You just do what you have to do, there was no money for a bigger property 🤷🏼‍♀️