Normalising small homes

[lorieats99]

I feel like you just see those big 4-5 bedroom homes on Instagram, and it’s often young-ish people in their 20s or 30s in them. I think that will be a thing of the past soon with rising costs. We rent a small-ish 2 bed new build and it’s easy to begin to feel inadequate about it! When guests come over there isn’t really anywhere for them to sit, as we just have one sofa. Two rooms upstairs, two rooms downstairs, downstairs WC and upstairs bathroom. Lovely spacious garden.

It feels like our home, I’d like a 3 bed in an ideal world but I don’t think that’s happening for us for realistically quite a while. Despite both being on average incomes we will probably be in our 40s before we achieve our forever home status. We are TTC soon, we have a small bedroom for the baby but we would have no room for a playroom or anything like that & I’m wondering how much this matters. I know in some parts of Europe people raise families in flats and apartments, and it’s very normal over there!

Does anyone else have a small home?

I see what rosetinted is saying, too - it is absolutely ridiculous that even DINKYs can't get on the housing ladder in London. But to my mind it's more helpful to frame it as 'even high earners can't afford to live in London' than, "I can't afford the traditional trappings of s middle class lifestyle so I can't be middle class".

And I'm boggled that you don't see any real difference in advantage between earning 130k and earning 13k. You have choices. You have options. You have hope.

When are Londoners going to start rioting in the streets about housing? When are we going to lose our shit at having all the unoccupied luxury apartments and ultra high wealth tax evaders rubbed in our faces?

We live in a 2 bedroom townhouse and love it. I bought it single and we've grown our family here. We have a DD and two dogs.

We declutter, make use of the space we have and love it. We recently viewed properties to move but it made us realise just what we have. Our mortgage per month is the price of the average new car, it's allowing us to live very comfortably through this cost of living crisis and I can work part time in a low salary job to be present for our young daughter.

There definitely is an obsession with bigger is better and keeping up with the Jones'

I don’t think anyone is disagreeing with rosetinted it’s just got a bit of a “woe is me, I don’t earn enough on my big salary” undertone.

Why is it so difficult to believe that the majority are on 'low' incomes. You can be average but still be on a low income. You can also be earning a wage that is higher than other people's but still be earning a low income. A low income isn't just a low income relative to what others earn. An income can be considered low if it cannot buy you what is considered a normal aspiration in a first world country- Mid priced house Quality healthcare Good education for your children

The average UK house is around £285k, the average joint household income is around £50k. Mortgage lenders will lend up to about 5.5 times your salary. The maths isn’t perfect but it checks out close enough. A couple earning and average wage can afford an average house.

Dress it up however you want, but a couple making £130k is over double the average UK household income. This isn’t a low income.

But the thing is - I can afford to live in London. I live in a 2 bed flat in a nice area in z3 and can afford overseas holidays, to pay my bills and can also afford to overpay my mortgage. I got on the housing ladder at 27 in 2019 largely because I married a native Londoner with an extremely nice mother who refuses to accept any rent for living in her house. DH was on free school meals as a mid and his mum never earned more than 17k (I actually think she earns close to £15k now and supports an adult daughter but is thankfully mortgage free). So I know what her life is like on £15k. She has the heating on mostly, does go on cheap UK breaks (walking holidays and stays in hostels) or to Europe to visit her family. It wouldn't be possible now for someone on that income to live in London unless they got council housing..

Of course my life is more comfortable than hers cos I have more money and can afford slightly more premium versions of consumer goods. Yet when you compare her property trajectory with ours we are almost identical. She bought a small flat in z3 north London (near me) at 27 with her ex partner (1989) and then a 3 bed house in the same area in 1996 (today's value would be around £625k as it is very small and more of a 2 bed).. we bought our flat at the same age (27 and 29) and we could probably afford a £600k property in 3 years time (in fact we qualify for it now but it is more risky with mortgage rate rises). Yet when you look at her job and salary, it was far below the average salary at that time and she qualified for a ton of child benefits as a result. She was considered poor. Yet we can afford the same kind of property in the same kind of area (DH is also her highest earning child) at roughly the same ages (only difference is we can afford more holidays and nicer 'stuff) so make of that what you will.

Mortgage lenders can lend you the money but a house which is valued at more than 5 times combined income is not affordable unless you have a big deposit. As we know from interest rate rises, it's not good to overstretch. My flat is 3 times combined income (£400k flat on £130k combined) and it feels just about right. I would probably stretch to 4 times at max so £600k on £150k combined in a few years (but by then it would be more comfortable as would probably have £150k to £200k deposit)..

Woe is me but woe is the 99% is what I am trying to say.

We are all in the same boat. Some of us have bigger problems. The Tories have convinced some of us that they are rich and comfortable and have nothing to worry about. I am trying to say - please do not think you are rich if you are on £75k because it really does not mean as much as it used to. Never mind the squeezed middle, you could become the new poor if you aren't careful.

When you have to sell your house to pay for cancer treatment (due to privatised NHS), I am not sure how feeling middle class would help..

Plenty of people including my family have children in small homes. Is it ideal? No. But there is no point envying Instagram lives of rich 20-somethings. I am also not married to a male model, employed in my dream job and jet setting across the world on glamorous excursions. Comparison is the thief of joy and all that.

We've got 2 kids in a decent size 3 bed but no playroom or play area, 3rd bedroom is a box room for our daughter.... downstairs is like a toy shop but hey ho, it is what it is, we are a family.....don't worry about it, you find a way round.....get a plastic shed to store toys or things from the house

We have just brought our first home. At 31 & 38.

We privately rented for 11 years, saved our bums off, started a business (DH), completed degrees, moved up the pay scale (me, teacher) had two children.

We could have brought a house/flat way before now, but there was always a hurdle, because of DH owning his business, they would always knock £100k off what they would lend us!

So we waited and waited, to get what we wanted.

We looked for 14 months, until we found our house- 3 bedrooms upstairs, dining room, big front room, plus a 1 bed annex and a huge garden. It was up at the same price as all the other ‘normal’ 3 bedrooms in our area. So we obviously grabbed it! (We had been looking for a long time, so knew properties like this didn’t come up- so we offered £6k over).

It needs completely gutting- which we have done most of it, but every weekend we are working away trying to get our house to look like a home! Thankfully I am now off work for the 6 weeks!

We have a high mortgage, because of the interests rate- but glad we got out of private renting when we did!

Not everything is what it seems. When renting, I wanted my own home. Now I have my own ‘large’ home, I want it to look nice. How many people are truly happy with what they have?

Our children are 9 and 4- they are happy, kind, friendly children- they grew up in moderate homes. At one time to save more for our deposit, we lived in a 1 bed flat with our 3 year old son -(now 9). It did him no harm. As long as children are loved, they will be fine 🥰

If you want guests, get a sofa bed! ❤️

Remember that what you see on TV shows, magazines, socials etc are allthere to try and impress you! They are not what "normal" people have or how they live, they are aspirational. Do not consider that this is what everyone else is doing of how you should live your life. This is the route to stress, anxiety and depression. Do your best and live a happy life x

I find it's downstairs space that's at a premium. Could you add a conservatory? It'd add valuable family space but could also have a sofa bed for guests?

When I retire I want to live in a tiny home on a reasonable piece of land so my doggos can run free and I can grow veggies, maybe rescue a couple of hens but mainly so I don't have to spend endless hours cleaning! I think small homes are the way to go.

It depends entirely on location though. When I lived in London I couldn't even get on the property ladder even though we hd two decent incomes. Now I live in a nice village in the north and I bought a 4 bed with a decent piece of land on a single income. Instagram is just a façade though. Everyone has something they've had to compromise on. I love where I live, but I have a large commute. If I moved closer to work, I would only be able to afford a flat.

We had a one bedroom flat when we had my eldest and I remember feeling so stressed about it but it was fine. We now have a bigger home- 4 bedrooms but we also have 5 children. I don’t feel overcrowded or anything. My only complaint is the more rooms you have the more cleaning you have to do!

It depends where you live, we are in Surrey (stayed close to my parents as one is terminally ill) we earn £120,000 combined and there isn’t a lot left after mortgage, nursery fees, utilities. We keep to a strict budget, shop at Aldi/Lidl, have only Amazon prime for tv, oldish phones, no takeaways/dinners out, certainly can’t afford a holiday this year and live in a very small two bed house. We get by but don’t have much money left at the end of each month. Obviously there are people a lot worse of but I honestly thought we would have a good lifestyle with our current combined earning but with the increase in everything I feel a bit miffed I can’t just go out and buy a new pair of jeans if I fancy it, I always buy secondhand or eBay if I need something.

I’m hoping things will change in a couple of years when my son starts school and I can work towards a promotion. I’m good with the budget, it’s just that everything is so expensive at the moment.

Given the cost of heating now, smaller houses are often preferable.

A relative has an enormous house - a normal 4 bed could fit into it at least twice over - and it’s really lovely, but last winter they simply couldn’t afford to put the heating on.

We live in East Anglia - there is no way in hell we could afford a 4-5 bedroom house. We have two children and live in a Two bedroom house. We are trying to move to a three bed before we have our third child but keep getting out bid by cash buyers!

we het on fine atm in a two bed house, we don’t have a playroom.

a home is what you make of it

This thread has been really interesting. We’ve definitely outgrown our 3 bed terraced house. It’s got three small bedrooms but I guess it means the third isn’t a box, the living room is open plan with dining room and kitchen is very small - I have had a mini breakfast bar put in after covid to give the illusion we have a space away from the kids!
We can’t afford to move - I don’t know if we ever will be able to with how things are. Wondering if once both kids are at school and I can earn more with no childcare costs it would even be worth moving as to get what we want (bigger garden as ours is very small and either a bigger kitchen or another living area) is worth another 150k!
We live in a really lovely area and can walk to the beach, have 3 beds, made a double driveway and could convert the garage but I don’t know if it would be enough to not feel closed in and really overlooked. The thought of being mortgage free at 51 sounds nice though.

I know we’re really fortunate and appreciate what we have but I think it’s when you thought you would be able to have the choice and it’s not massively out of reach and you feel stunted.

Perhaps look at older style houses. Our first house was 2 bed but the downstairs had an extension so was much more spacious than upstairs. I personally dont like new builds. We moved when our first child was 2 to a 3 bed house but times were different. My daughter is just buying an older relatively spacious 2 bed flat. (In London) and will no doubt have her first child whilst there.

But surely as you go through life you upsize your home? I have, as have everyone I know. My mums in her 50s and moving to a larger home now (despite her children being adults and no longer living there) because it’s exceptionally miserable living in a tiny home there’s not room to swing a cat in.

Layout and storage has a lot to do with it. For years we lived with two children in a 2 bed flat. It worked well for us because we had a garage for storage and because the living/dining room was quite big (second bedroom, bathroom and kitchen were tiny) so plenty of space when people came round. If we'd had a garden we might be there still, I still think of it very fondly.

That’s not so easily done nowadays. The costs of moving are huge now, and the price of houses too. Most people don’t get commensurate pay increases. I thought I’d stay in my house for five years. 25 years later we are still here.

I think the difference (I'm in Ireland but I guess similar to the UK) is that property developers here tend build apartment blocks that are the absolute minimum permitted size (some celtic tiger apartments in Dublin can't fit full-size single beds) and rarely have shared public spaces, so they're not really fit for purpose when it comes to raising a family.

My former apartment in a major european city on the other hand was considered on the smaller side at 110sqm, with two bedrooms (1 fit a king bed, the other had two singles), 2 baths, guest WC, a small utility, a terrace and a basement 'cave' for storage (bikes etc). Very easy to live comfortably in.

Totally. The expectations that people should just buy bigger and bigger homes especially when they’re young is a recent thing in the last 15-20 years.

It’s going to be a rude awakening to all those who believed a brand new car and a brand new 4+ bed house and the latest iPhone is an entitlement, and because of low interest rates it was possible.

Ask most people over 40 but under 50 (so not a ‘boomer!’ what their first house and car was and I can promise you it was a £2k shit box and a terrace or a semi at best - because you had to work your way up.

My first house from 2000 has just gone up for sale and can be bought on the same average income multiple today as when I bought it - only my mortgage was 7%.

But nowadays you’d be lucky to buy a house at all let alone work your way up to a bigger house.
And I’m saying this in my mid 30’s with a small terraced house, which I don’t think we’ll be able to get any better than.

That is the difference.

My house is tiny, one reception room plus conservatory, but I can seat four guests in the sitting room. I’ve got two sofas and a dining table for four. Most of my furniture was bought specifically for the room, though. Maybe look ok at getting furniture that fits what you want to do with the room?