Can’t believe how much money my parents have amassed

[Tallular819]

My parents started out with nothing, not a penny from their families. My mum was a dinner lady, Dad was a secondary school teacher.

They paid off their mortgage in their 40s. As children we had a holiday abroad every year and multiple uk holidays throughout the year.

They had a lease car which would be replaced every 3 years with a new one.

They paid for mine and my sisters weddings and house deposits.

They’ve travelled all over the world in their retirement and I’ve just found out they have £200k in savings.

WTF?! DH and I have comparable careers, we run 1 old banger of a car, we have 1 uk holiday per year, we’ve stopped at 1 child, we’re on target to pay off our mortgage when we reach retirement, we have a grand total of £4k in savings. We don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t buy expensive clothes.

Its just hit me how vastly different our financial situations are. I didn’t appreciate just how different the cost of living is today compared to 40 years ago.

Gen X here. Around 10 of my friends bought 2nd properties in London in the 80’s and rented them out. All now mid to late 50’s with property portfolios worth a million pounds or more. Teachers, social workers and other public sector workers. Almost all retired at 55 with (admittedly reduced) pensions but not much need for them. Almost all have inherited in the past few years on top or who have elderly parents with London property. One is a multi millionaire due to this. Crazy.

Afraid so. And I haven't spotted the old "but we had 15% internet rates!" yet but am sure it will along soon.

Tbh I’m not surprised. Many people of their generation bought houses for peanuts. An average 3bed house in Surrey in 1980 cost 25k and 59k in 1990. Now the average is around £600k- or more. Whilst salaries were low (average teacher might only take home 8-9k pa back then), it was very easy to pay those mortgages off within 25years as salaries increased.

I fear that my kids will not get on the housing ladder without money from us and their grandparents, especially with salaries for even the best professional jobs being so low. Think there is another thread about the starting salary for civil servants - it looks barely enough to cover rent/utilities and food - let alone clothes, phones, transport or student loans. But I do remember living with my grandparents/extended family, family of 4 in two rooms downstairs, while my parents saved up to buy a place. Expectations of younger people were lower in some respects whilst they also carried less debt.

It's hard not to feel bitter about how much wealthier the Baby Boom/early Gen X generation are than the rest of us. I, like a lot of people on here, have friends and family that age with no qualifications, who've had very ordinary jobs, who nonetheless have done extremely well for themselves because of being able to live off one salary, pay off the mortgage for houses that have more than quadrupled in value since, and save large sums of money because the cost of living was so much cheaper.

And we won't inherit any of it because it'll all be eaten up by care home fees!

Hey-ho, it is what it is. The only time it really grates for me is that the older generation (and I am talking about my parents here) think the reason they're richer is simply because they worked harder. I obviously understand that they have worked hard and they weren't simply handed everything they've got (although both my parents have also benefitted from some inheritance) but they didn't work harder or have a harder lifestyle than anyone working today. I work my arse off for a very average income, as so most of my friends and peers my age (later Gen X). I'm about the only one of my friends who wasn't helped onto the housing ladder by their parents, because even in the late 90s/early 2000s, it was getting too expensive to buy a house on just one income.

Boomers have really ruined everything for the younger generations.

Again the usual poor me stuff.Of course it is hard for a lot of young people re housing and moneyand some older people have 'amassed' a fair amount of money which will go in their care probably.There are a lot of people(often single, often older) who through all kinds of situations, not all of their doing, are not well off in any way.Mumsnet is incredibly mean about the Waspi women and the female to female misogyny is incredibly sad.Unless you have a different system which does not involve owning a house this is how it will be and I am sick of the nasty generational jibes even when they are apparently subtle. You cannot reform or tweak capitalism and its just bloody cruel to say'oh you made the wrong choices' etc.

The past is another country and all that. Can change it either.

I find it fascinating how much personal finances/ budgets have changed since the 70s & 80s. Consumer electricals in particular were so expensive compared to now.

Many older people began work at 15, lived at home and saved up until they got married and bought a flat or small house, so fewer went on to higher education, then rented independently or flat shared as they do now. People saved up for household goods and had a ‘bottom drawer’ of sheets, linens and all kinds of things.

It’s true that the expectations of basic necessities has changed considerably. Few had a TV and certainly not more than one. People used public transport more, didn’t expect to have more than one car, didn’t have the white goods and time saving appliances that are usual these days.

It’s also true that the biggest change has been in house prices, which are out of reach for many.Our first house was mortgaged at 3.5 times joint salary and the interest rate was 8%, which is why I had two jobs for a while.

Our mortgage was paid off long ago, but our saving are nowhere near the six figure sum mentioned. There must still be some older people who struggle to manage without a private pension or savings. Those are the people who should have WFA.

I think it's more of the older generation making out that the reason younger generations are struggling are stupid comments about mobile phone contracts, netflix and costa coffees which are trivial costs compared with the almost exponential rises in housing costs which many "boomers" have made vast amounts of money from by pure luck rather than what they claim to be wise investments! Same with savings/investments - it's a lot easier to make huge growth in values of investments when interest rates are high - again, "right place, right time" rather than genuinely intelligent investments!

That a good illustration of house prices and wages being so out of wack.

Rents are so high as well - we'd really struggle if starting out now - we're late 40.

You may wish to ensure that your parents seek to mitigate their IHT exposure, rather than have Reeves and her merry bunch of thieves take it.

By doing what? How did your own parents or grandparents personally ruin everything for you and the rest of your generation? Sorry, not sure from which generation you hail?

I remember our TV and white goods were rented from Rediffusion, on the high street. If you couldn’t afford the TV or the tumble dryer, you sent it back for a few months and rehired once your finances were sorted. You weren’t locked in like you are with HP agreements and the hire costs were ‘reasonable’. You knew money was tight if you got home from school and the TV was gone.

Well said. Having generations at each other's throats is a great way for politicians to dodge having to actually do anything to make this better. It does sometimes read as if younger generations think that the boomers deliberately e.g. ratcheted up property prices and caused pollution on purpose whereas they just happened to be alive when those things happened. (I'm Gen X but I remember only being told about CFCs and greenhouse gases being a problem, recycling was not even being considered and I think only the most aware had an inkling of the importance of carbon footprints etc.)

The redistribution of wealth when the boomers do eventually die will make for an interesting economic situation, unless of course their house values and savings are eaten up in care costs. That will be a one and done, though, and of course not every Gen Xer will benefit by a long chalk.

I don’t think op sounds ungrateful or envious. Just surprised.
Lucky you to not know anything about your parents’ wealth. Wait until they can no longer do anything for themselves and you have to manage their entire life including their finances 🙄

My mum and dad bought their house for 3k in the 60s.
Its now for sale for 600k and they spent the last 25yeasrs of their lives wintering in the Sun in a villa.
She was a housewife all her life and he was in the accounts of a large company for all his life.
I am due to inherit a chunk.
But then he beat the shit out of her all her life and we had a shit childhood.
So its not worth fuckall to me really.
Perspective is everything.

Thanks for that. I’d be pretty annoyed if my parents said things like that but they don’t because they realise how lucky they were. They actually bought a plot of land and designed their own house which isn’t something you could easily do today, unfortunately 😕

True. They "claim" it wasn't their fault, but they consistently voted for low tax political parties, they voted for their mutually owned building societies and insurers to be privatised to get often huge windfalls, they bought shares in BT, British Gas, etc to quickly sell the shares to financial institutions to make a quick killing, etc. Many have bought properties to "buy to let" to make money out of the younger generations. They really can't claim to be innocent in all this!

No, it's just the lack of recognition of the truth of the situation that rankles. If older people gave the slightest hint of acknowledgement about how lucky they were (as lots do, to be fair) that would be one thing.

But many don't do that, and actually crow about it. I just couldn't imagine benefitting from housing costing a fraction of what it does now, convincing myself that it was all down to my wise investment decisions, and then telling less fortunate people that they could have done the same if only they had fewer TV subscriptions. I think that would make me a truly horrible person.

That’s a nasty thing to say. Why are you so bitter towards me? We’ve never met. I simply have a different opinion to you. You’re not facing an existential crisis because I disagree with you 🤯

Totally agree with this. I grew up for many years in a caravan park so was traumatised by growing up with no money.

I started investing in the share market when I was 19 with just small amounts of money from my part time job. Have worked full time until I had kids then moved to PT. I had old crappy phones for years, we camped / stayed with family on holidays with the kids until the youngest was 8. Before I was married I shared a room in London with friends. At one stage there were three of us in a room! When married we stayed away from phone plans, subscription services, and take-aways etc. All the things that suck up the cash. Kept putting spare money - never much - in the markets when I could. If you can see what has happened to the market over 30 years you will understand. Compounding is amazing, it's like magic. People just don't understand it and I will reiterate I was putting tiny, tiny amounts in that I could spare.

My house is now worth 7 figures and has been paid off for 10 years. I have more money in investments than I will likely ever need. I keep working as the fear of poverty runs deep. I could stop working and never work again and I would be fine. I am 50.

Not saying I recommend my way as I guess it is extreme for how people live now, but it is just an example of what can happen if you spend less, invest, and allow time. Some of my staff at the office earn 25K/year and get 3 or 4 Deliveroos every week!! They are opting out of their defined benefit pension to buy Deliveroo, I just can't believe it.

Spend less. This, and the magic of time, is part of how the older generation "amassed" their "fortune".

Exactly the same for my parents @dogcatkitten. They both worked their whole lives. My Dad in a support role for the Police and my Mam in a shop. They never had two halfpenny’s to rub together. I remember my Mam being really grateful for Pension Credit in her old age as for once in her life she felt comfortable. She lived very modestly after Dad died. I just don’t recognise the scenarios in this thread. Among my circle of friends their parents are in the same boat as mine were. We are in the North East maybe that makes a difference.

Living really frugally until you die doesn't sound massively appealing though. My ex in-laws are like this too. They've lived very, very quiet lives. They seem happy with that but lots of people aspire to more, myself included!

Some of your (as in forum members) parents sound horrible ☹️ Mine wouldn’t dream of saying things like that. I think I’m beginning to understand why some people on here are so angry with their parents if they’re saying such awful, and patently untrue, things to them.

This is is absolute nonsense.

The baby boomer generation (my parents) haven't ruined anything. They merely were born and lived in the world as it was/is as we were all born and are living in the world as it is for our generations.

Ic you want to point the finger of blame try successive shortsighted govt economic policy.