Housing Crisis - 5 in a two bed flat

My parent was one of 6 kids. They lived in a flat with 2 bedrooms, a living room, a kitchenette, and a bathroom. The three girls shared a double bed in one bedroom, the three boys shared a double bed in the other. They slept head to toe to make more room. Used coats as extra covers in winter as they didn't have enough blankets. I presume my grandparents slept in the living room but I don't know what the set up was. This was 1940s.

Change of circumstance fine… desire for more kids… so what?! You have a responsibility for them!

China - and India too - is basically overcrowding on an entire country level. Obviously, the methods, the human rights abuses and the ramifications of China's one child policy were horrific; but the general sentiment about there being far too many people in the country wasn't wrong.

My dad was one of 11 children - he shared a (double) bed with 5 brothers. His 5 sisters shared a different room.

I simply don't get the people saying about more than 2 people sharing a double bed. Maybe if they're all very young, but they're only going to grow bigger before very long. How can they physically fit?

When you say 'sharing a bed' between 6 of them, do you just mean they took it in turns for 2 (or maybe 3) of them to have the bed whilst the others slept on the floor?

Change of circumstances, yes. But, an “overwhelming desire” for a child you can’t adequately house? No. I mean do it, if that’s what you want but don’t then complain about lack of space. It’s a choice.

It’s also nice to feel like you have separate spaces. Probably better for her mental health not to have to stare at her bed when she’s watching tv and to get the transition between spaces.

The best reception room is weird - surely a bedroom for her and your grandfather makes more sense? People were proud back then though, it would have been to keep up appearances.

As for the inappropriate dogs, that’s a tale as old as time!

So she had people getting up and wandering around her sleeping? Would you like that

I'm 43, I grew up in a 3 bed council terrace, I shared a bedroom with my 3 younger sisters in 2 sets of bunk beds until I left home at 18 and my brother had the box room. Noone called it a housing crisis then though. It was northern Ireland and up our street was a family with 13 children on a house the same size .

I didnt even have a bedroom as a kid. I slept in the corner of the kitchen and later on in a corridor. With rats and no central heating or double glazing. This was in the 60's though.

I'm not as squeezed as that, but I do sleep in the sitting room so my two kids (actually young adults, and one has a bf who stays over a lot) can have a bedroom each.

Luckily we have a second toilet which is quite roomy so I have built shelves in there and keep all my clothes and bedding in baskets. Its not great, but its ok.

My gran raised ten kids in a two bed cottage! Not all at the same time, to be fair - the eldest had moved out before the youngest were born. But they had a girls room and a boys room, each with four singles crammed in (the ceilings were too low for bunks). You had to walk through the girls room to get to the one bathroom, so your sleep would be disturbed all night. Her husband slept in a kind of cupboard off the bathroom, and my gran slept on the sofa downstairs.

Two things I struggle to understand, though: one is that they had two reception rooms but one was kept for 'best' and no one was allowed in there. Which was weird because they never had visitors. Second thing: she had alsations. Bloody alsations when there wasn't room to flick your hair...

Agree. It's one thing to do the odd day here or there at a kitchen table but to do my job properly I need keyboard, mouse, 2 screens. My partner ideally needs 3 screens (that's what he has in his work office) but we don't have the space to accommodate that.

It’s pretty normal for families to cram into houses/flats around the world. When the kids get older it’s a bunk bed and a single… used to be really common. If that’s all the parents can afford then so long as it’s safe, secure, warm, clean and there’s food and love and laughter - what is the issue?

I'm quite happy to have given up my bedroom so my 2 can have a room of their own. They won't be here for ever so a few years on a sofa to give them the privacy they need as teenagers is no issue for me. The parents chose to have the children so why can't they make do?

Many people did have space for their children when they had them but following on from marriage breakdown/and or being priced out of the rental market things changed.

My parents always stayed in a hotel when they came over to visit. The average family doesn't have a guest room in the south east anyway.

Why not just sleep in the sitting room. Surely a better option? Sounds so claustrophobic!

Bravo for her but I worked from home during lockdown from my dining table and ended up with serious back issues and really can’t do my job effectively without a large monitor and 2 screens and a proper mouse and keyboard.

Well she's happily done do gor over 6 years now

Reminded me of Bill Shankly. One of ten kids..family of 12 , 2 roomed house…later got the 2 rooms next door as well. When you see the footprint of the house, which is all that’s left now, it’s tiny.----

That’s really bad for you though both physically and mentally. I also have no idea how people can get office tasks done with just the one screen. It’s so much slower

My friend works from home. On a laptop at a table in her one bed flat

What I can't understand is people who are in emergency accomodation with kids already, having another child while they are still living in one room in a hotel. I've seen it happen a few times. I don't know if it's that they think they'll ultimately get a bigger house.

Both me and my partner's employers have down-sized their office capacity massively since COVID. It's now expected that we will work from home part of the week. That's fine for those with large houses but for junior colleagues it often means working at a desk in their bedroom in a house share. For us, we have a 3 bed and 1 child - so our spare room gives us one 'office' space but we can't both work at home at the same time.When we move we will be looking for a 4 bed.

That’s great for you but not everyone is fortunate enough to plan to this degree and also change of circumstances or overwhelming desire for more children is a factor