To wonder how people are going to actually buy houses?

[slatternlymother]

There's going to be a whole generation that can't, isn't there?

What about those people who rented due to circumstances/not knowing if they wanted to live there long term/work commitments etc, and then hit the wrong end of the financial crisis?

We rent, and have (luckily) really well paid jobs for our age. We are 25, and between running a car, putting DS through nursery, and just living, I doubt we'll have enough of a deposit to buy anything reasonable before we're 30. 28/29 at an absolute push. And that will be pressuring us to make a choice on where we're going to be living, but we won't be able to leave it much later because otherwise we'll be tied up in a mortgage forever.

But we are so, so lucky. Actually, it was blind luck that got us here.

And if we're struggling, how the hell is everyone else coping? Tbh, I'd happily rent all my life, but I worry about retirement age and no longer being able to pull in a decent wage.

AIBU to think that long term, more and more elderly people will have been in rented accommodation their whole lives, so when they do retire; they're going to have to fall back on the state, aren't they? To put them up in council accommodation?

Isn't this just a massive time bomb for the future?

Sorry for rambling thoughts, I just have been thinking about this quite a lot recently

Sorry I got the year totally wrong on my last post. I bought in 2004 - at ths point properties were over double what they had been just a year earlier. In that particular area of London there was not very much subsequent increase.

I moved to the Home Counties and bought a bigger property in 2007 - everyone said I was a fool and a crash was imminent. Prices have remained stable.

More interestingly houses are selling - so someone must be buying.

I'm not disputing that people struggle to buy property of course they did, i did - and i certainly gad to "settle" re my first place- but I'm not sure it had ever been that different - eg. in the early 80's when my parents were starting out and interest rates were 14%

I agree that the situation is going to force talented young people elsewhere - a brain drain of sorts.

While my DD was born here she also has a Canadian passport and although Canada lacks some of the things I like about the UK I would tell her to go there in a heartbeat!

Ps of the people I know who have bought in the last 10 years about 70% got help from parents.

Meh, folk love to doom-monger.

House prices in my home town (beach city, North America) are hideously more expensive than most the UK (comparable to London prices). My dad's flat, about 100 m^2 is worth maybe $1.5million. Young people still manage to buy there, too. We take it more in stride when our houses get repossessed, too.

There is a lot of 'grass is greener' on this thread.

Multiples might be higher now, but when my parents were trying to buy their first house the woman's salary wasn't taken into account.
My parents first house had an outside toilet and no bathroom (in the 70s).
Interest rates hit 15%.
Credit for new furniture etc wasn't available. Ikea and cheapo flat pack didn't exist so furnishing your home was difficult.
Money wasn't spent on holidays, phone, TV, Internet, wine, clothes etc Food shopping was from the market, meat very rare for them and clothes from charity shops.
That was NOT unusual, same story for many of their friends.
They both went on to have very good jobs and contine to trade up, but if they hadn't had an exceedingly grim few years initially then that wouldn't have been possible.

This how dh and I did it:

Saved £4500 deposit living while in crap rental (London) over 2-3 years, age 24 bought house £45,000 in cheaper area (near home town of Wolverhampton) and rented it for mortgage cost. Sold for £64,000 age 26 after personally tarting it up on the cheap. Now just over 25K deposit once new savings in (no mobiles, car, tv etc in this time). 25% deposit on 1 bed 100k flat in rubbish part of London, age 29 last year sold for 125k, again only cheap workon it such as paint and treating damp ourselves etc. Nearly 50k deposit on 300k house and huge mortgage.

No parents, that's how we did it. It involved 6 years of second hand clothes, no contracts of any kind or car. Our choice. Now I know we were lucky to have two teaching incomes but I know a lot of my friends could save like this. Obviously many can't, but I do think a healthy chunk of those who say it's impossible to buy could go frugal and save, or even move in with family to save but they choose instead to run a car, have sky, good mobiles, holidays etc. That's fair enough, but they choose that over saving.

Obviously this post is about dual income/ no children couples who say it's impossible. I feel bloody terrified about how I'd now cope if I became a single mum of two in london, and I have a good salary.

'Meh, folk love to doom-monger.

House prices in my home town (beach city, North America) are hideously more expensive than most the UK (comparable to London prices). My dad's flat, about 100 m^2 is worth maybe $1.5million. Young people still manage to buy there, too. We take it more in stride when our houses get repossessed, too.'

The difference is that the rental system there is far more secure.

I was perfectly happy renting in N. America. Year-long leases, apartments well-run and nice, just ring office for repairs. No BTL bastard renting hovel or arsewipe letting agents. Year up, just renew lease, rent would rise, but not by ridiculous levels - no fees for that. Or move.

We bought our first flat when I was 30. It was a 2 bed in lovely area (london) and ds was 2 and I was at home and it was only 2x dp's very average salary. Now 17 years on we have more savings better wages etc but we wouldn't be able to buy it! Most of my friends who are still in the houses they bought about 10 years ago couldn;t buy them now. I have just bought a flat as we are downsizing and it is an absolute wreck and is 10X average local salary plus needs about 50k spent on it. I have been renting for 15 months and it has been a nightmare damp expensive no storage and just awful.

C'mon, noddy, you know the only reason people can't buy is because they have iphones, Sky, go out and take holidays! If they just tighted up their belts, it's entirely possible.

. Something needs to change But what? I definitely think no second homes etc with mortgages.

Tax the hell out of second homes the way they do in other countries. End BTL mortgage, it's commercial/business mortgage or nowt.

And the private rental laws need massive revision.

Pie in the sky. None of that will happen.

It's easier just to scold others who all have iPhones, Sky, take holidays and go out.

You shouldn't have to give up living to put a roof over your head!

I'll never own my own home. That's not doom-mongering it's just a fact.

I'm a lone parent. I already shop at lidl, rarely eat meat, very rarely (even then it is an evening in my local pub) go out and haven't had a holiday of any description since my honeymoon in 2007. I do that just to cover the rent and bills.

I live in a very cheap area and the 2 bed terrace I live in now is only worth about £130k. However, I work in an average salary job so even if I miraculously managed to save £20k no bank would ever give me a mortgage.

I don't have family who can help and there won't be any inheritance. It's shit. I've failed my son because he'll never have a secure roof over his head.

My LL is really nice (if ineffectual) thankfully and my rent is pretty cheap but if/when they want us out I honestly don't know what will happen. The wait for any kind of LA housing is 10+ years and no private LL will look at me because my wages are topped up with benefits.

But yes, it is all my fault. If only I hadn't bought that flat screen tv from tesco three years ago for £250 I wouldn't be in this mess would I

There is going to be a huge generation of younger people who are forced to rent perpetually to pay for the "haves" (i.e. older generation who already got the best of all worlds - very cheap housing, free university education, generous final salary pensions etc) to keep their standard of living. We will have a society of young slaves who will probably never be able to retire (because the retirement goal posts keep being moved) in order to pay for those in their 50s/60s to retire early with a nice big property, big pension pot and all the little extra benefits they get such as winter fuel allowance.

The government is doing everything it possibly can to keep asset prices (homes) high since our whole economy is now based on the equity in houses. The Tories (and Labour) have a vested interest in keeping this divide since most mp's are either rich, own multiple properties or are landlords and they both parties get a lot of money from building companies and rich landlords tend to vote in favour of a party that keeps them rich and makes them even richer. The younger generation have no money, so basically no say and it will be pretty awful for them - forced to live in some tiny crap hole that they pay exhorbitant amounts for so that some rich landlord can keep up his/her lifestyle.

The only people able to live in London, for example, will be the very rich and those in social (subsidised) housing.

It's absolutely scandalous and a damning indictment of how morally and economically corrupt this country is.

I agree tax BTL to F. I don't think holiday homes in rural communities etc should be allowed at the detriment of locals.Rentals need regulation part time half arsed landlords are everywhere.

There is a lot of 'grass is greener' on this thread.

But it was easier. No amount of budget shopping, getting charity shop clothes or not buying 'stuff' is going to get me a deposit easier.

My parents bought their 3 bed semi for £56,000 in 1992. He earned £28,000 as a teacher, she worked part time in a care home for aboout £7,000 a year.

So yes, sorry, but it was easier, because house prices were lower. If my husband and I earned more than half the cost of a 3 bed semi in a Cornish town, then we wouldn't be in this situation.

I find the notion that if the younger generation just stopped holidaying, buying flat screen TVs (as someone pointed out earlier; you can't get a cathode ray TV anymore so ), shopping 12 times a week in Waitrose and buying Gucci shoes, insulting frankly.

How about I take you back to the beginning, put you on the average UK wage, with 2 kids, hmm? Go on, save up a £50,000 deposit whilst you're still paying to live somewhere else. Even a total shithole will cost you £700pcm these days.

And btw, I'm not pointing out how bad things are for me, because they're not. I just think it's so easy to look back and think it was easy, when in fact, a lot of that generation were incredibly lucky.

I don't begrudge them that; good on them. But I don't appreciate being told I'm just not trying hard enough. No one here has said that, but boy, has it been insinuated in rl!

It's ok to moan slatternly, just because your situation isn't the absolute worst it could be doesn't mean it isn't shit.

If there's two if you and you both earn a decent wage you should be able to buy a house. It shouldn't be as hard as it is.

The phone thing makes me laugh. Give up your 35 a month contract phone and in 10 years you'll have saved £4200. Not nearly enough for a deposit in most areas. Anyone claiming contract phones are a reason youngsters can't save a deposit is clearly out of touch with how much deposit is required.

I know, mine is £15! My sky/broadband is about £40. I could be rich beyond my wildest dreams

In ten years that would save me precisely £5500, what prey tell is that going to buy me?

(Although how anyone can still justify calling Internet access and mobile phones a luxury I really don't know.)

I lied, it would be £6600. I think I'll go for a detached then.

Randall It's true though!

And does nothing to help people. It's this smug attitude you get of 'well, if you just gave up X and stopped living frivilously and buying wine...' Wine? Wine?! When actually, a lot of people were very, very lucky. If they'd just admit that!

It's infuriating but sadly the people who think like that refuse to see it from any other angle. It's almost as if they feel it devalues their struggle to admit that anyone could possibly struggle more iyswim.

(Maybe I'll tell them I just spent £400 on an iPad. That'll have them frothing all over the shop!)

I think I have made more cutbacks in recent years when I am supposedly better off on paper than I ever did when I bought my first house! It really was fairly easy then.

My parents never saved a penny in their lives and got a 100% mortgage that was 1.5x their joint income (It was in Liverpool in the 1980s) which grew in value enough for them to be able to buy in London 5 years later. They weren't on high salaries (teacher and journo) and got all of their furniture from Habitat on credit. They sold a painting to pay for the removal van, so adverse were they to saving.

Actually you could get far more on credit (or the never never then) than you can now actually.

They are well aware that giving up a mobile phone isn't going to magic up £40k into my wallet.