So what happens when we're all old and we don't own our homes?

[user8665410]

Genuine question.

I'm a millennial with no hopes of ever buying a property despite earning a decent income.

There are many in my situation.

What happens when we're all in our 70s, 80s and 90s - which we will be because medical technology keeps letting us live longer - and no longer able to work. Where will we live? Who will support us? Will we just get kicked out of our homes we've been renting for (potentially) decades??

My current rent is £2,585.00, the State won't be supporting that I'm sure.

thanks for sharing. that is so depressing when you put it like that

My workplace pension is a joke paying into it for 8 years only £3800 in the pot I'm now almost 53 granted I've never earned alot only around 15000 a year as I have mental and physical issues but even so

My kids will have a deposit but will struggle with the mortgage multiplier factor.

Sorry bit off topic that was but I'm also stuck in rental.

"It's selfish not to birth children to wipe my arse for minimum wage when I'm old" is a HELL of a take.

It really alarms me how many people view children not as beautiful unique human beings in the own right, but just as future worker drones.

And yet we're the selfish ones, for not wanting to lumber a poor innocent child with a horrific future on a boiling planet where they'll be exploited as cheap labour?

This is true only if we keep the Tories running the country and to the ground in the next 20-40 years. Policies can change but the problem is, a lot of Boomers and their children vote Tory to benefit from their own generational wealth. We need people to actively not vote the very government who will run Millennials and Gen Z into abuse in their most vulnerable years. The other problem is, Brits are lazy. They complain more on social media than at the voting station.

This!
My DD lives in a northern city with great transport links and rents a 2 bed flat for £650 pcm.
Salary is 30K and she's saving for a deposit.

Really irritating when Ops do this, like that amount of rent is the norm.
Make a different choice.

I agree completely. If you can save up enough money for a deposit on a house then brilliant! Go for it.

A lot of which is free. Medical and equipment certainly are. Social care is assessed and attendance allowance can be claimed to help towards this

The current system of needing a large deposit does make buying a first house extremely difficult. If the OP is paying £2500pm in rent, she could easily manage mortgage repayments. Her problem is the deposit. Needing a large deposit massively favours people already on the property ladder, but this needs to be addressed by the government.

I've thought for a while that the conservatives need to do something, because if in 30 or so years there are a lot of people wanting to retire but stuck paying rent or relying on benefits then a lot of people in that age group- traditionally a significant proportion vote conservative- won't be voting conservative. So from a purely selfish perspective, they need to sort something out.

This is true only if we keep the Tories running the country and to the ground in the next 20-40 years. Policies can change but the problem is, a lot of Boomers and their children vote Tory to benefit from their own generational wealth. We need people to actively not vote the very government who will run Millennials and Gen Z into abuse in their most vulnerable years.

The tories are talking about scrapping IHT, its bonkers as it affects so few & the money will likely still go on care but I think it could be a vote winner.

@Flopsythebunny some relatives of mine needed care in the home and the state provision was non existent, there aren't the staff & no consistency. They went private. One of my parents neighbours spent about 80k on an op, the NHS waiting list would mean that by the time he got the op potentially his health would have been irreversibly impacted.

It’s will mean downsizing and moving to a much cheaper area. If landlords are agreed a fixed rent many will take it up and allow the council to manage the property get regular payments and not have to manage the property/deal with tenants

im guessing he rent if for a family home as that is more than the average wage after tax is paid

It's also not easy for everyone to get a mortgage, even if they do have the deposit.

It seems likely the OP from what they've said about their situation would be able to get a mortgage, but not everyone is eligible for one.

There's also the concern of rates rising. My best friends bought via shared ownership last year, and their mortgage has just gone up so much that between mortgage, rent on the part of the flat they don't own, and standing charges for the building, it would be cheaper for them to have stayed renting.

That’s not that far fetched. With no property owning self funders to prop it up, the care system will collapse.

Exactly. It’s funny because of the people I know who live in London in my peer group 9/10 of them aren’t born bred Londoners. And they are complaining they can’t buy.

If I had come in here as OP and said I am born and bred Chelsea millionaires row. Can’t believe I can’t buy. This is my birth right. I would get laughed out the room.

We moved, like the majority of those who were born bred Londoners. Its one of the most expensive cities in the world. It’s not a birth right, so I don’t get why those who moved there think it’s their right. There’s plenty going on outside London. Unless your city of London. In which case you earn enough anyway. I don’t get it.

My Aunt lived in a tower block in her 70's which was council owned and only for over 60's.

And where's the housing and jobs gonna come from for all us Londoners you think should move, then?

You'd be the first ones complaining if we all moved to your town and send rental prices skyrocketing and took all the jobs.

Out of my group of six close friends, three have received no or very little inheritance because parents homes had to be sold to pay for care.

Also, "only the super wealthy elite should be able to live in London" is very dangerous, since London dominates the arts, media, politics, finance, and many other careers. It shouldn't do, but it does, meaning people with careers and talent in those industries have to live in or near London.

Do you want to live in a world where the media is run exclusively by the wealthy upper classes and foreigners? (It already mainly is, but there are at least some regular people to stop it from spiralling completely out of control, and you want those people pushed out.)

Where ordinary working class and even ordinary middle class people are pushed out of the arts?

Where politics and finance are the preserve of the elite?

Where London becomes a ghost town and tourist attraction, and ceases to be a vibrant living city?

The biggest threat to the UK is how completely divided we are, and the way politicians try to weaponise and push that sense of division even further. The last thing we need is to be even more divided.

So no, my working class arse is going nowhere. I won't be forced out of my own home, abandon my career, and give the city of my ancestors over to the corrupt elite, and I won't be fobbed off with the idea I should settle for a crap life and no career for the privilege of maybe owning some shitty little terrace house.

Because it doesn't need to be this way. Vote in a government that's not entirely corrupt and doesn't act solely in the interest of the elite. Ban foreign investors from buying entire neighbourhoods that stand empty. Force foreigners and corporations to pay tax. Put restrictions on slum landlords and foreigners buying up swathes of our country for rent. (And those of you smugly talking about how cheap your rents are: if we don't stop this now, you'll be next.)

@Echobelly, this problem has been talked about by social welfare people for a few years, and has been described as a ticking time bomb.

As things stand, a renter retiring today with a decent private pension plus state pension would have to use some or all of that private pension to pay a chunk of rent. If they had savings, of over £16k, they wouldn't get a penny in help towards their rent until that was below £10k, so if they got a decent lump sum with their private pension they would have to use it on rent. And the maximum eligible rent would be capped at the local housing allowance rate for a one-bed property, usually well below the average rent.

This is one of the concerns about the falling rate of home ownership and lack of social housing, although the wait for social housing for older people tends to be shorter, as properties become vacant more often as they die or have to move into care homes. There will be generations of pensioners who derive next to no benefit from their private pensions, and an ever-rising cost in benefits for those who don't have good private pensions.

My MIL gets pension credit, (which is only about £2.50pw less than the full state pension) as she only worked for 15 years and was a SAHP for most of her life. She gets all the rent on her 2-bed council house paid by housing benefit and 100% of her council tax covered. There's no "bedroom tax" to encourage pensioners to downsize.

My late DM got full state pension because my DF paid NI for her. She also got 50% of his private pension when he died, and most of it went on rent because she didn't qualify for any help (they were also in council housing).

On a macro level no one should be forced to relocate because they are priced out of their area, it's unethical, unfair and I agree dangerous. However, on a micro level, we all have one life to live and have very little influence over the status quo. We took the decision to move hundreds of miles away from family for our careers, cheaper housing and general improvement in the quality of life for our kids. People affording £2000+ on rent likely do have a choice, it's just a pretty shit and unfair one, and not an easy one. It's fine to need to moan, and discuss society at large, but ultimately, we have to take control of our own lives (when we can, I hugely appreciate that level of control is still unequal, based on privilege not just financially but things like health, upbringing etc) I think that's where people are coming from when they say move, it's not to say it's fair or easy, but is likely an option on rent of £2000+. I know in the SE that sounds normal, but £2000 rent is unfathomable in many areas of the UK too, so see it from both sides.

Not just that. But who is working in the hospitals, the schools, the shops, the cafes etc.

London commuter belt now covers such huge swaiths of the south east. Those locals have been pushed out further, which compounds the problem further, as that areas now more expensive and on it goes.

No, their offspring will inherit.

Completely agree that scraping inheritance tax would be a vote winner. Cheered on by the tabloid press spooking the gullible and stupid into thinking the government was going to take every penny you ever had (even if they did you'd be dead anyway so wouldn't need it).