Outnumbered - is the lifestyle realistic?

[Mrsemcgregor]

So I’ve been watching Outnumbered on Netflix with my DS (he loves it!) and I’m wondering if the lifestyle they have is achievable in London considering their jobs?

Pete is a teacher in a secondary school and is yet to achieve head of department and Sue is part time in what I assume is an admin/PA type role. I’m hypothesising that their joint income is likely to be around £60k? Maybe £70k. Where I live they would be lucky to be on £50k but I’m adding extra for London wages.

The house they live in is huge! I am not sure where in London it’s meant to be, but their is a scene where Pete mentions problems on the tube so I assume they are within the underground network. It’s 3 stories and at least 4 bedrooms and two bathrooms, a massive kitchen dining area, a garden and a nice sized lounge with a big bay window. Even where I live that would set you back close to £500,000. That house must cost a fortune in London?

Pete’s mum and dad are still alive as is Sue’s dad so I’m assuming no large inheritance, and they mention a mortgage so they haven’t inherited the house.

Can any London mumsnetters confirm or deny that this is realistic?

(I know I have far too much time on my hands and have given this way too much thought )

Maybe one of them had a large inheritance from their grandparents/a rich godparent or something? Or they inherited the house and remortgaged for a smaller amount?

See I think Pete and Sue/Hugh Grant in Notting Hill/Bridget Jones are wildly unrealistic when it comes to expensive London homes...then I watch Location Location Location and Kirsty pipes up:

"This is Tess and Jon. Tess is a part time viola player and Jon runs his own flamingo training business. They're looking for a 3 bed property in Pimlico with a budget of £1.7million."

Are they fucking drug dealers or something?!

They wouldn't necessarily have needed a hefty deposit. 100% mortgages were still a thing when they would have been buying. I got my first flat using my graduate 100% mortgage deal. And I have several friends who funded their nice houses because they bought flats in dive areas of London that got gentrified very quickly.

But Bridget Jones's flat is next to a pub, above something or other and pretty awful . Not sure where it's supposed to be?

Haha! Never really thought of it before. As I haven't watched it for a while and was younger when I did so less aware of this stuff. But definitely not. We left London on a joint salary of 70k as we couldn't afford to buy anything. So even if hey bought at a good time it seems unlikely they could afford the house.

Borough market, london bridge area surely

Not so much the lifestyle but he doesn't seem to do much work in the evenings or weekend for a teacher

@ShipOfTheseus

My house is exactly the same as the Outnumbered house, except without the side return extension. I’m in Clapham- but in Lambeth, not in Wandsworth. We bought it in 1997 for 200k.

Out of curiosity, what do you think it would be worth these days? £2 million?

Well, it depends, do they avoid shop bought coffees and drive an old banger? You can afford anything if you do that, apparently.

Bridget Jones' flat is very recognisably slap bang in the middle of Borough Market.

Well in the 80s that was a shit hole! And it doesn't look great in the films! Sorry, no offence meant.

Just for fun, where in central London would a teacher and part time admin assistant with 3 kids live today? And what would their house/flat be like?

Well, let’s say they’re a 30yo teacher and full-time PA pre children. Maybe an ex council flat on an estate in central London. Alternatively, a 3-bed semi in outer London.

Bridget Jones isn't set in the 80s. The first film was made in 2001 by which time Borough Market was very much a thriving and desirable area (I would know as my best friend lives there).

Thriving and desirable in 2001? Well maybe. I had my first dc in 1994 and was an early ranger South of the river.

Following JoJoSM - Thornton Heath/Mitcham? Even Croydon or perhaps Whyteleafe - I know a few 30 somethings who have bought in Whyteleafe post baby.

@GlummyMcGlummerson

See I think Pete and Sue/Hugh Grant in Notting Hill/Bridget Jones are wildly unrealistic when it comes to expensive London homes...then I watch Location Location Location and Kirsty pipes up:

"This is Tess and Jon. Tess is a part time viola player and Jon runs his own flamingo training business. They're looking for a 3 bed property in Pimlico with a budget of £1.7million."

Are they fucking drug dealers or something?!

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

IME part time music teachers are trustafarians.

We bought a house in 1991 in London for 105k. Sold it in 1998 for 180k. Zoopla now says 790 - 973k. My salary on the same scale would probably be 2 and a half times as much. Also, back in the 1980s, our interest rate was in double figures!! It was affordable on our salaries - I'ma teacher, dh is better paid. We're similar ages to the characters. No way could we afford a 900k house now if we were buying from scratch.

@Chicchicchicchiclana the book is (early?) 90's though. Assuming she's loved there a good 10 years too

Out of curiosity, what do you think it would be worth these days? £2 million?

Nowhere near! £1 million perhaps. Mine is down at heel, with all sorts of problems. That’s the problem with London. We could afford the house at the time we bought it, but our salaries haven’t progressed to match. We can’t afford the maintenance, never mind doing it up.

Glummy, I had a similar job to Bridget in the early 1990s. I earned £16,600 pa. Believe me, that was not enough to buy a 1 bed flat as a single person anywhere in London at the time. Perhaps her parents gifted her a huge amount.

@ChalkDinosaur

First series was 2007 (yes I just googled it 😳) when Jake is 11. So if they bought it before kids that would be early/mid 90s. I'd say it's possible, although it looks wildly out of place now!

See also Spaced, where two 20-somethings on the dole/one with a PT job in a comic book shop could rent a whole flat in London...

Spaced was set around the corner from DH’s student flat in Finsbury Park/Manor House, and was filmed a few years before he lived there.

It was a grotty flat in a grotty area, in the mid-90s that was totally doable for two people on fairly crap pay - DH paid about £50pw for his room, I doubt a room in the Spaced flat would have been any more than that.

@Chicchicchicchiclana

Glummy, I had a similar job to Bridget in the early 1990s. I earned £16,600 pa. Believe me, that was not enough to buy a 1 bed flat as a single person anywhere in London at the time. Perhaps her parents gifted her a huge amount.

I always assumed she rented that flat, she didn’t own it.

In 2005 exH and I bought a 1 bed flat in SE25. We were both on £15k per annum (I worked in development at an art gallery and exH worked as an AV assistant at a hospital - both in central London) and we got a 100% mortgage for £134k. Now the flats are £240k but those jobs only have gone up to about £19-21k and there are no more 100% mortgages.

That's hilarious cos i thought the exact same thing when i was watching it the other day!