*OP how do you think your parents got their financial security/house/etc? they worked hard...and saved....and raised kids....and worked....all at the same time, so why shouldn't they enjoy their hard work now?
What's wrong with millennials doing the same?*
And the digs only get more blatant.
Every generation has lazy entitled people. Doesn’t the fact that you think an entire generation is just too lazy to be as successful as their parents might suggest a systemic problem?
Because that’s not what I see at all. Admittedly, I’m only just regarded as a millennial, but everyone I know my age works 60-70 hours a week and have since they got their first proper job after graduating (several spent years working two full time minimum wage jobs just to be able to afford rent, myself included, until they were able to get a proper job). Still, their income (even when married and joint) is often nowhere near what they need to be able to borrow enough to buy any property, let alone an actual house.
I’ve had to stop working full time for now because, while we planned carefully to be able to afford childcare once we had our one planned baby, I had two at once and would not be able to afford full time childcare for both.
Meanwhile, my mum got an entry level job with a bank at 16, was able to buy a house for less than 2x her salary in her early 20s. Her mum looked after my sister and I while she worked. She worked exactly 37.5 hours a week, worked there until she was retired on ill health grounds, and then got a decent pension from her employer until she died (and they still pay 50% of that to her husband).
I don’t know a single millennial who has those opportunities, outside of those who are in the top couple of percent of earners, and they are working much longer hours and live in places where property prices are often out of reach even to them.
So yes, I get a bit tired of hearing how millennials just don’t want to put the work in, from the generation who profited massively from the increase in property prices through their lifetimes and somehow see this as money they’ve earned rather than been gifted by a system that’s screwed over their own children and grandchildren.
I never took money from my mum once I left at 18. I worked to put myself through university, she didn’t contribute and I didn’t ask her. I never expected or asked her to sell one of her properties (yes, thanks to BTL mortgages, even my sick and retired Mum managed to own two rental properties in addition to the family home which gave her a very nice quality of life - she didn’t work hard for the opportunity to do that either). However, without my children asking, I would absolutely downsize / sell assets to help them buy a property as long as I could still manage. The difference is that I understand that it’s highly likely that they’ll be working harder, longer and still struggle.
My mum never met her grandchildren - my DH and I were trying to be responsible and wait until we could buy a property first. We thought we had plenty of time but she developed terminal cancer way before it was possible. No one could have foreseen it and if I could go back I would do things differently and have children sooner. If I’m in a position to help my kids earlier so that they can get on with their lives, that’s what I’ll do.