To think these baby boomers are missing the point?

[Hundredacrewoods]

I grew up in an area where house prices have quadrupled since 2000. I consider this an intergenerational equity issue. Whenever the topic of house prices and 'millennials' comes up with my parents' generation, all I hear is how hard they worked and how much they sacrificed to get on the property ladder. AIBU to think that they're missing the point? No one is denying that they worked hard and sacrificed. The point is that if they worked just as hard today, and made the same sacrifices, it wouldn't be anywhere near enough.

Agree with the need for more social housing. State also needs to start buying off land at reasonable price, not inflated market prices. Taxation of foreign investors buying property and leaving them empty. Could be a start.

I know plenty of people who prioritise their daily coffee/take aways/meals out/weekly bottle of wine then moan because they can't afford a house. Tough shit, the world has changed, there's no point looking back and being jealous of other people having it easier because i wouldn't want to go to the 50s/60s/70s even if it did mean cheap housing. Wasnt exactly a lovely time for women to grow up was it?

Perhaps if so many people weren't blindly funnelled towards university like sheep they wouldn't have so much debt. Unless you've got a career in mind that requires a degree there's really no point in going (apart from to get the "experience") then of course the obligatory "gap year". Someone said that someone may not want to live in a £50k flat in Gloucestershire and may want to be in london. Tough. If you really want to be on the property ladder you'll buy what you can afford and make sacrifices for it. Even if it is a 1 bed flat that needs work in an area you don't want to be in. The people that moan about this stuff expect everything handed to them on a plate. Im a millenial so not defending baby boomers, i just can't see the point in looking back and being jealous instead of bettering your own life.

It’s the baby boomers doing buy to let and replacing social renting - not sure this specific to 'Baby Boomers' though is it? People are using buy-to-let income as their pensions so would think this is more of a thing with Generation X/Yers? (If you recall the Baby Boomers are the ones who benefit from good pensions)

Agree NewYear, and it's not just commuting costs but childcare costs as well if kids need to be in care for longer.

Also the constant talk of London is disingenuous. I live next to a new town which constantly features on the shortest towns to list. A 3 bed house will set you back £500k for which you will still need a £70k deposit.

And sadly, people are buying so late they do need 3 beds either because they have children or they know they can’t afford to keep moving with stamp duty in the tens of thousands

I know plenty of people who prioritise their daily coffee/take aways/meals out/weekly bottle of wine then moan because they can't afford a house.

If you stopped your coffee, takeaways and weekly bottle of wine you might afford a house at 80s prices.

If you stopped your coffee and takeaways and one bottle of wine a week it won't make a blind bit of difference towards the £70k deposit you need in London.

Do the maths.

I would agree it is tougher these days, but people seem to have much higher expectations now. I think back to having to buy a house in a very dodgy, unpopular area... A house with no running water , heating or inside loo. We had no TV, computers or other tech. Mortgage rates were 17.5 % We didn't have holidays away. We didn't have student debt, but that was because hardly anyone went to university. I wonder how many today would put up with this in order to get on the housing ladder?

I have millennial children so sympathise with the lack of affordable housing, particularly rentals.
I am not a baby boomer.

Me and OH didn't buy until our mid thirties (like my parents). We bought cheapest house in cheapest area. No one wanted to live here.
15 years later and our house has increased by ££££££££ (the majority of that increase in the last 5 years).
Three beds round here are upwards of 500k. That is for an ex council. Victorian properties will set you back 750k

Thing is. The people buying these properties are not middle aged. They have all buggered off to Clacton. They are young families in their twenties. This is a very sought after area by young people, not established families.

I don't deny its hard for millennials but there is still plenty money out there in the hands of those who have always had it. Meanwhile the renting crisis is being sidelined by this mania for owning property, something that has always been out of reach for large sections of the population.

I think many Baby Boomers had to come to London to work because the industries on their own home turf were decimated during the Thatcher years (thinking ship-building and mining). They came as economic migrants and have stayed. But it did mean that they had to move away from their families/friends and way of life. That's hardship in itself.

I do think this thing where 50% of the population gets saddled with uni fees debt is a major part of the issue though. Amongst Baby Boomers wasn't it only about 5-10% who went on to do degrees?

I'm not sure it's hugely different. My DD was looking at a house yesterday - almost a copy of the house we bought 30 years ago. Similar jobs so I imagine similar income level.
It wasn't just the interest rates, but unemployment and the risk of. The standard of living was much lower years ago too.

Agree with the need for more social housing. State also needs to start buying off land at reasonable price, not inflated market prices. Taxation of foreign investors buying property and leaving them empty. Could be a start.

Absolutely.

Actually BiologyMatters it WAS great growing up in the 60s/70s. Although I agree that women's issues were not much thought about or campaigned for during that period, I don't think many of us actually cared then. We were having a good time anyway! Didn't see many of us shouting and screaming and being 'offended' about everything.

I think back to having to buy a house in a very dodgy, unpopular area

I would do so. All the former dodgy areas in London are gentrified and eyewateringly expensive.

Streatham for example. It was very rough when I was at university. Now a tiny one bed flat is about £375,000.

Totally agree MrsDV that there are still plenty of people with money and always have been. There is a tendency on MN to argue that everyone is a pauper. I can only think of a couple of people in my “circle” who struggled to buy a house and it was always because they were single and therefore stuck on one salary. Buying on one salary has never been realistic for most

@cherrycokewinning
'A 3 bed house will set you back £500k for which you will still need a £70k deposit.'
Why? There are loads of 95% mortgages on offer now so you would only need a 5% deposit, still £25k but considerably less than £70k

I think its pretty 'grim' in Essex ( born and bred here ) overcrowded, expensive , not that pretty , parts of it are really horrible, some bits are very nice but snobby all run by men. Dhs job has always been here so not had much choice in where we live. The roads are awful.
Its my home but i wouldnt choose to live here if i had more choices/ money or won the lottery! Cant speak for the rest of the South east or london though as never lived there.

I'm not a babyboomer but I have my own 4 bed house in London and was lucky to go to uni when it was free and I had a full maintenace grant. In our late twenties, myself and DH bought our first flat in 2004 for £160,000 on a combined income of about £45, 000 and lived with IL's to save for the initial deposit although i'd never recommend anyway to do that. We sold the flat in 2009 for £195,00 and bought our house for £295,000.

Within 2 years of the sale, our flat was back of the market with an asking price of £400,000. So in 2 years the income multiple had rocketed from our do-able 4x salary to nearly 10x salary. The area has also become somewhat trendy and I imagine the same flat would command about 0.5 million now. This is what millenials are having to deal with, rampant house price increases which are totally out of proportion to normal salaries and with stricter mortgage lending criteria leaving no choice but to rent indefinetly. I really feel for this younger generation

I think it's still very possible but it's all about priorities.
If people really want to get on the housing ladder they will work damn hard and make sensible choices.
What so many do though is blow thousands on a wedding, have children, a SAHP or one that jus works a few hours a week and then moan they can't afford a house. Life is full of choices, some are prepared to work hard for what they want whist others think it should be handed to them on a plate for no effort.

That's typical baby-boomers talk right there. Zero empathy, zero understanding of current economics. Full of superiority.

If she's not a Brexiteer, I'll eat my hat.

Why have millennials turned against babyboomers and made them the focus for hate and envy?

Perhaps, for some, it's easier to whine "it's not faaaaaaiiiirrrr" than to address how they might improve their own situation?

Yes, there are some areas where the cost of housing is a colossal problem

And yes, there are some boomers who are so selfish that they don't even think of the problems others encounter

And then there are some millennials who've spent so long in today's everyone-must-have-prizes education system that they simply can't understand why everything can't be theirs for the asking

People - and circumstances - are various

IME 95% mortgages are not available on ANY property. We offer them on qualifying new builds under the government scheme but I haven’t seen them commonly on any house.

Some people have to work in London.

I started work in the 70s recession and could see location-specific industries being closed down. I purposely chose a job that I could do anywhere, as an insurance. Non of this "but I have to live and work in London" guff that is trotted out now.

Different generations have their own struggles.
Unemployment was dire in the 80s. I'd rather rent and have a job really.
As a woman, not being able to buy property easily or take loans out in the 70s, or even been paid relatively equally.
Limited childcare in the 50s 60s meant there was no going back to work after babies for many of the population.
In the 40s your education and life was destroyed / affected by the war.

In my social circle, most baby boomer parents recognise that younger generations struggle more than they did to buy property and are often generous, either with cash or with time such as; babysitting grandkids.

I hate pitching generations against one another but I do have to say, please stop with the comments about 6“oh we didn’t spend money on iphones”^ when they didn’t even bloody exist! It doesn’t make you seem financially savvy, just silly.