To expect my adult children to return home after uni?

[stepmothersknockers]

I can't see how any young people are supposed to live independently these days. All my friends seem to just accept that their children are still living with them in their 20s and even 30s.

Unless we stump up house deposits (not possible) or tell them that they can only 'survive' as a couple, how are they going to live independently?

DH wants us to get a bigger house to accommodate more adults. I sort of want to buy a flat so they can't come back. ;)

fiveacres "After all, if in three years they haven't saved enough for a house deposit then that would be indicative of some major financial troubles."

You expect your kids to be able to save a minimum of £10k in 3 years, possibly on their own, while renting/maybe running a car?

I am 27, after Uni I moved into a house share and got the first job that I coulD. After 4 years I met my partner and we moved into a rented house. My parents couldn't afford to give us a house deposit so I now rent with my partner and son. We will be renting a very long time yet.

I don't understand people who return home after Uni, I am proud I have stood on my own 2 feet since I left for Uni at 18. Never asked for a penny from my parents. Loads of people I went to Uni with are living at home again driving their parents mad. They are the ones who were unemployed after Uni as they would only apply for graduate jobs. The friends I lived with just applied for any job and took the first ones while we kept looking.

My parents bought their first house at age 42 (which was about 5 years ago) so even if your children haven't bought a house by the age of 30 it doesn't mean they never will!

It is hard but if you want to manage you will manage.

Hopefully ds1 won't want to come back to our sleepy town after he graduates, still 3 years off though.

But isn't this all due to changing expectations?
Not so long ago, marriages were for life and families of three generations living together were normal. Now, single parent families are common and every 'single' adult expects their own house/flat. Grandparents are left with empty rooms.

We live in a fairly rural area and the average salary is around 15k - and that's AVERAGE (not seasonal).

Renting is more expensive than owning around here - isn't that normal these days?

Gawd it's hard. The thought terrifies me too Saucyjack. I think that DH's plan is probably sensible though (to get US a massive mortgage so we can get a good size house, despite being Quite Old). I cannot possibly live in our v. small house with a whole load of adults.

Most of my friends do, though.

URGH!

It's pretty hard to save for a house deposit whilst paying rent out of your earnings in the years after graduation. Dh and I did manage it, partly because we met quite young so started sharing rent/bills quite early in our 20s. But the main thing that helped us was, weirdly, our landlord. He owned half the street and was a benign, rather patrician old chap who charged us half the market rate and allowed us to sub-let the spare room to our friend. Between that and living on Waitrose cheapies we managed to save a house deposit in a couple of years. But that wasn't through "hard work" or "being careful". We were just bloody lucky.

I expect they may need help after uni And living with us for a year or two would be fine. I could provide them the rental deposit for a flat and the first month's rent. But that's it. They would be on their own after that.

DSis moved straight out after uni. I came back for a year, then moved abroad.

DBro didn't go to uni, started working straight after college 6 years ago. He still lives at home and doesn't pay any rent.

Nothing to do with me but I do find that ridiculous. He earns a good wage and I was charged a token amount when I was back.

Majority of my friends have now moved into rented places, but at 21-24, most still lived at home. At 26, I only know of one couple who have bought a flat and that was due to the Bank of Mum and Dad giving them a £25k deposit.

My DD returned home after graduating last summer. She got a casual job locally and worked towards doing a 10 week period of volunteer work abroad. She returned home after that mis April and threw herself into applying for jobs.

She has now been offered a job in central London and will be moving to live with her boyfriend in Brighton soon ( we live in Scotland). He has just graduated and is looking for work. They will have to be self sufficient and manage rent, travel and all other bills. She is 22 now. She needs (and wants) to be independent of us.

She has some money saved from her previous job and some money we have saved for her so is lucky that in that respect but i expect it will be pretty tough and they will struggle a bit. But then we struggled too at that age and it made us work all the harder to get to the comfortable position we are in now.

She has no expectations of ever owning a house and is not worried by the prospect of renting long term. I think that's just how it is now, especially if you live around London.

Plumping

No. I said I expect them to be able to save enough for a house deposit in three years if they were living at 'home', that is, with me, and therefore not paying rent.

As such, the 'rental income' they would otherwise be paying would be saved and would over three years add up to a deposit for a home.

However, if they didn't want to move back home that would be fine too. I was just answering the OP who foresaw adults in their 30s living with her

Who do so many of you sound do nasty and bitter about parents helping out?

I moved home until I got a job, then my ma gave me three months to save up for a rental deposit and that was it.
She wouldn't have kicked me out but I would have paid her the same rent plus food etc.
And I think this was completely fair.
I rented somewhere a bit grotty, I sold my car, didnt have sky, had a pay as you go and ate cheaply. It's what you do when you start out. Onwards and upwards and that sort of thing.
I couldn't believe it in my office when my coworker was amazed I'd moved out. Her daughter the same age and in a better paying job couldn't afford to be out as it would 'upset her lifestyle'
If she moved out she couldn't afford her new car, sky, nights out, salon treatments, her clothes as the poor little dear had such expensive taste, and she needed her designer bags.

We live in a fairly rural area and the average salary is around 15k - and that's AVERAGE (not seasonal).

Renting is more expensive than owning around here - isn't that normal these days?

This is the problem faced by our son, aged 23. He commutes 40 miles each way a day to work, he earns minimum wage but is in a highly specilaised field of work. We live in a village and he commutes to another village. As things stand he cannot find a deposit to buy a house but cannot find one close enough to where he works to be able to get to work without a car. He cannot run a car and be able to afford rent and house shares in small villages are as rare as hen's teeth. His choice at the moment seems to be give up a job he loves and try to find something he won't be as happy doing in order to get his own bedsit or stay home and see where life takes him.

My 25 year old daughter still lives at home but has got a deposit, together with her boyfriend, for a house so will fly the nest very soon I hope.

I moved out when I was 18, much to my mothers displeasure. My brother stayed at home till he was 31 'cause he was allowed to get away with getting his washing done etc. He had plenty of money to move out. I don't understand it personally. I think adults should go out and live their lives.

Stinkers

I suspect a lot of it is resentment. I don't understand it either.

My then boyfriend (now DH) and I worked away for two years after Uni. We returned to my parents house (the box room too!) to save like mad. Managed a year there and got a deposit to buy a flat nearby. Had we not returned home for that short time, we would have ended up renting and never saving a deposit.

Should my DC need, I will offer the same. However I wont be moving to accomodate this - they can make do with the space thatis available. I know being in the boxroom immediatley adjacent to my parents room was a catalyst for how quickly we saved our deposit

I do think that some of it is about managing expectations. DH and I were in our early 30s (now early 50s) before we had saved enough money for a house deposit. For most of our 20s we lived in shared houses or bedsits in what was basically student-type accommodation. I would expect our children to accept that they will have to do similar until they have got a decent foothold in their careers. That being said, I would be happy for them to live at home for a year or two if they found a job locally (unlikely) and were saving a decent amount of their salary.

I think this largely comes down to where you live. I'm fortunate enough that I lived in the suburbs of a large city with 2 good unis in the centre so I stayed at home throughout uni, as did all my friends and my now DH.

It meant that we could save our part time wages whilst studying and allowed DH and I to buy during the summer before starting our grad jobs. By late 20s all our group own homes and none of us are from wealthy families or had any help with deposits.

In other areas I imagine this just isn't possible as the wages don't match the house prices/rent. In which case I'd have definitely stayed at home to save up.

I completely understand about not particularly liking the idea of sharing a house with a bunch of adults - even if it is your kids home from Uni - husband's son is coming home this month from last year at Uni. And I know he will be expecting to be waited on hand and foot while being treated in every other way as an adult.

Ah, now that makes sense fiveacres! I agree, it should be possible under those circumstances.

I must admit that I managed to save £6k in 2 years whilst working and renting, but that's because I was a bit insular and never really went anywhere or did anything I'm expecting other people to be a bit more lively than me!

I'm not resentful of parents helping at all - my dad gave me most of the deposit for my first flat (my money paid the legal fees/part of the deposit) and helped me/my husband to buy our more recent house. He'd feel remiss as a parent not to, and I intend to do the same for our kids.

It is resentment. I plan to give my child anything and everything I can afford. They need to be self supporting eventually, but I won't hold off giving them financial help at the beginning. I didn't get any from my parents but that's no reason why I can't do so myself. I anticipate it will be extremely hard for them to buy a home in 20-25 years time. If we can afford to give them a leg up, why not?

saved as I earned but it paid for each year's holiday

So you weren't saving for a house deposit, you were spending your money on holidays.

I think people think it's shit that young adults are force by awful government policies into being dependent on their parents well into their 30s.

They think that the country might be better off if the success of the young was more dependent on their abilities than the size and location of their parents' house.

I had an absolutely awful time at and when I left university as my dad had moved in with another woman (mum had died when I was at school) and I wasn't welcome.

Living was difficult. I had some houses shares but had all my stuff with me. I still have nothing from before I turned 25 - no old clothes or trinkets as I couldn't not have absolutely everything with me. Eventually I married a tosser for security. Not a good move! My kids can stay with me until they are in their 60s if it stops them feeling as I once did.

Most young people rent now. I know of very very few friends who have returned home after uni and neither me nor my brother did. If you can get a job you can stay away. I've seen people do it on jsa as well though. It's about being smart.
I believe the best thing we can teach our kids is good money sense and budgeting. If you suss that in vast majority of cases you can go very far.

In our (quite expensive city) you can rent a room in house share in a nicish area for £400 month, on a fullt time (even low) graduate wage this is perfectly affordable. If can get a job there is no need for them to be at hom. If unemployed and job searchin-then yes they may need to come back for a bit