How old were you when you moved out of your parents’ house and why did you?

[Junaluma]

I was 25. I lived at home during university but I met my then DP while I was at university. I guess I moved out as I wanted to start a life with my now DH! Still see my parents on once a month or so.

What about everyone else?

First time was at 16 to go to college and move in with my uni student boyfriend. As you can imagine that lasted all of about 9 months. Lol.

Second time was when I got my own rental flat aged 20, but landlord turned out to be dodgy AF, and I ended up with a lunatic cock lodger who beat me up every day and refused to pay the rent. I ran away from there back to my mum's after a year. Leaving nearly all my possessions and the guy stalked me for years afterwards.

Then the third time I left my mum's was when I moved to the states for six months. Then I lived with a dodgy bloke back in the UK. Then travelled around Asia for a year.

Now I'm back at hers again, 20 years later and we are basically eachothers carers. I really wish I had had a more successful life and I would have my own home. But it is what it is. And I'm very grateful.

17

17, because I was the only one in university with a 10pm curfew which was crippling socially, and I was able to because I had a boyfriend with somewhere to move into.

17 couldnt wait to leave.

Went a long way away.

19 to move in with my then boyfriend in our first rented house together. We married shortly after and bought a house a year later. Been married 15 years, 3 kids later, still in that same house.

I was 20. I’d been with now DH for 6 months and he already lived in a flat so I moved in with him. My parents were horrified as they are very old fashioned. My Mum didn’t speak to me for a month. I’d never felt so free!!!

He had been married before (divorced when I met him, no DCs). They assumed as a divorced man he must have been awful. Ironically, now we’ve been together for 30 years, they think the sun shines out of his arse!

Moved out at 18 for uni, moved back at 21, spent a few years travelling, and stayed living with my parents until I was 27 when I bought a house with my fiance.

15. I wasn't allowed to sit my GCSEs or go to college. I packed my bags the night they poured water on my college application.

18, after A levels I left to go away and work. Never went back. No animosity, I just didn't want to live at home any more.

26 …. I was so nervous about living on my own, once I moved into my own house.. I wish I’d done it sooner:

That is really difficult to read. I am sorry you were treated like that.

17, I was 6 months pregnant, walked into the kitchen one day and mum just decided I had to move out there and then. She hadn’t even discussed it with my dad. So I packed my few clothes and left. I was at college, and in an abusive relationship.

Although we get on now, I have never really gotten over it. I never returned home.

17 for university. I visited sometimes in the vac, but we were skint and had a tiny house and I had lots of younger siblings who were tripled up in bedrooms, so I slept on the sofa if I came back and anything I hadn’t taken with me was boxed in the attic. I think it was a good thing. No possibility of ‘failure to launch’ because there was nowhere to retreat back to. I’d left at home at 17.

17

I had always wanted my own house.

Golden Boots Brother was younger & could do no wrong. He'd take stuff out of my room & I would just get told to stop being so mean/selfish.

I was expected to do lots of things around the house after school but GB didn't have to do a single thing.

Then I'd always had a fair bit of freedom, but my parents didn't like my new boyfriend (perfectly lovely bloke, decent) and so I started getting curfews & general restrictions. Unreasonable ones.

my Dad (who I adored & now miss so so so much, he died) would say 'while you're under my roof xyz) so one day, I'd had enough & found a house share & moved out while he was away for work. Broke their hearts & have felt a lot of guilt over the years, but it is what it is.

18 and off to university.

Moved back with them after uni at 21 but felt suffocated so moved out a few months later into my own one bed rental flat.

I was 21. It was the dawn of the New Millennium and boyfriend (later husband) and I bought our first home; a 3 bedroomed semi.

It didn't feel too young at all to be buying our first home, in fact felt overdue.

I left aged 18 to go to university. I deliberately chose accommodation which allowed me to stay all year round as I never planned to live at my parents again. For various reasons I got a council tenancy aged 19 so that allowed me to have cheap self-contained housing on a secure tenancy. I bought it under Right to Buy 20 years later.

23
Moved in with my boyfriend of the time. At home, I was sharing a room with my sister, also in her 20s. Would often get locked out because she had her boyfriend round.

Sibling, partner & baby moved into family home which was just a bungalow and I became the target of all annoyances. Zero privacy, went through my rubbish and refused to knock on the door. Just scapegoated & targeted until I was kicked out when I finally answered back to defend myself. I was a really good kid with no bad lifestyle/habits or anything. I just worked late at McDonalds (2/3am) which annoyed them and they wanted me gone and wanted my room as space was lacking.

Ended up on the streets with my stuff in a bin bag (thrown at me by my Dad as he drove off). Lost my job of course as I had no address. I then got into a homeless hostel shortly after, penniless and hungry, whilst they all went on a foreign holiday.

Just turned 17. My mum kicked me out. Moved into a squalid bedsit with no notice and fucked up my A levels.

16, moved abroad, came home at 17 for bit and moved out at 18, mortgage by 19 and never returned. No reason other than I was really independent and wanted to live in my own place.

I went to uni at 18, but still went back home in all the holidays and still had my bedroom there so wouldn’t necessarily consider that completely leaving home. After uni I moved into a flat with my boyfriend who became DH a few years later. I couldn’t drive for medical reasons so didn’t want to move back to the village with terrible public transport where they live and wouldn’t have been able to get to work, but I also didn’t want to live with my parents again because they are very difficult people to live with.

18 for university. I have never lived with them again, although I’ve stayed for short holidays, taken my kids to visit of course. I’ve been relatively independent though in terms of finances because I moved in straight away with my DH after uni. When one or other of us did an MA or had to move jobs, we supported each other (financially as well as other ways). I suppose if I hadn’t been in a committed relationship I would have moved home.

17, nearly 18, but I had left boarding school in England and my parents were living in Australia at the time (Naval posting), due to come back the following year. Boarding school made me pretty self-reliant.

I moved out properly at 25.
Worked full time from 18, so I definitely felt like a proper adult and was saving to buy with my then boyfriend.
Then we split up and I met DH who lived an hours drive away from my job and home.

I split my time between houses then so only moved out properly when I got married. I really, really hate commuting.

My parents must have the patience of saints! I look back on that time with them with huge fondness though.

As DH and I won't be able to give DC a financial leg up we intend to do the same. They can stay as long as they need to save up.