AIBU to wonder why retired parents live in big houses and don't help family?

[Dojos]

Not judging the choice but i can't help finding it odd that you can have two sets off grandparents living in and owning several properties and adult children both in full
Time work struggling to make ends meet.

Bright enough and big hearted enough to know inheritance is a gift not a right, and rightly so. I'm just curious how parents can sleep In 5 bedroom homes they don't need at night whilst their good steady grown up kids struggle a whole Gang into a 2 or 3 bed semi.

I guess that applies further - why do the elderly generation not downside and keep the lifecycle of a family home going?

GreenTulips the majority of equity in property was not earned, hard or otherwise.

And what you’re actually saying is you’d rather other people pay for you than use your own money to do so. It’s attitudes like this that cause the friction between generations.

I think the problem is that they have NO CONCEPT of intergenerational differences.

Ha! Pot. Kettle.
And your DC will say the same about you, thirty years from now.

I don't think, without actually talking openly to our parents about the financial issues they faced at the time, that any of us can totally understand the differences in our circumstances. For example, my first mortgage (1993 I think) was 33k, but on a salary of 9.7k, and I had to find 10% deposit. That mortgage had an interest rate of about 15%. Fifteen percent. It was a massive financial burden at the time, but in perspective now, 33k for a 2 bedroom flat in a stone built house.....well, I'd look at that from the outside and think "HA, you had it easy, easy easy!!!". At the time however, it was heart stoppingly terrifying. It's all about perspectives.

I do have some sympathy.

Given that house prices, at least in many parts of the U.K., are relatively so much less affordable than they were 20 or 30 years ago,. I don't understand why parents who could well afford to help, don't or won't. Though I have to say that most parents I know, who have been able to help, have done so.

However if that would mean downsizing, that is a somewhat different matter. Most people aren't rattling around in 5 bed houses with 3 receptions and large gardens that are much too big for them. Most older people's family homes are rather more modest, and in many cases, moving to something a bit smaller in the same area would not release all that much cash anyway - not after all the costs of moving, fees and stamp duty, etc. Not to mention all the sheer hassle of chasing agents and solicitors, packing up, getting rid of so many possessions.

Most people are not in the happy position of one pair of downsizers I read about, who sold their sizeable period family home in Richmond (SW London) for well over £2m, and bought a large, newbuild 3 bed flat with 2 balconies overlooking a royal park, for £1.3m.

And what you’re actually saying is you’d rather other people pay for you than use your own money to do so.

And?

Is it better that I didn't buy a property, rented all my life and then claim housing benifit in my old age? How does that work? What's the difference?

The government would, if I needed care, receive the first £££ from the sale of the property, contribitirong towards care cost v contribution towards housing benifit - what's the difference?

Most people struggling in a 2-3 bed semi wouldn’t be able to afford the 5 bed detached; especially if house prices fell.

We had to have IVF for our kids, which we paid for. My MIL always says that we shouldn’t have had IVF then we would have been able to afford a house.

Apart from the fact it is inaccurate, it hurts. A lot.

@themythical - next time she says it suggest she doesn’t see her grandkids then as she feels you shouldn’t have had them. Some people are idiots.

Thanks Glug44.

In some families it does happen that the old people downsize to a smaller house or bungalow and one of their children's families take on the larger house. I've seen it happen a lot with farms that the grandparents will move to the son's house down the road when the son takes over the farm.
Reasons why they don't want to downsize - I can only speculate, but I think having space for relatives to visit is a part of it. They want to have spare rooms for the grandchildren.

TheMythicalChicken
"Struggled my arse. In the 1960s you could buy a house for the equivalent of 1 years’ salary. Now that has increased to 20 years’ salary"

"The baby boomer generation basically took all the houses and all the money and kept them. Added to that, we are all paying their pension with no realistic hope of getting one ourselves. They are the greedy entitled ones, not us"

TheMythicalChicken unless you lived through the '60s and' 70s you cannot have any inkling of what life was really like in those times. We "baby boomers" haven't always had it as easy as you seem to imagine.

I'm not judging or anything but I cannot understand why my generation seen to want everything handed to them and feel hard done by that their parents who worked 40 years and are now only able to enjoy themselves are not providing them with free childcare, a house and whatever else they are supposedly struggling for.

80sMum, I do know what it was like and life was definitely easier then. Housing was much cheaper, there was social housing for anyone who needed it and people didn't work nearly as long hours as they do now.

I cannot understand why my generation seen to want everything handed to them.

They don't. They just want the same advantages that were afforded to previous generations.

LaurG I totally agree. I see the same things all the time and my parents have no understanding of how hard life is for my brothers and I.

Lots of comments here suggesting the younger generations would be 'grabby' to think this way. As a parent myself, I would think it would be grabby not to consider passing on some of our hard earned and (not so hard earned) wealth, no matter what age they are. They are still our children, adults or not. Children that we chose to bring into being!
While my MIL is a millionaire who cares not for anything but how much she can be adored. Her sister is quite the opposite. They are both very fit & healthy, yet DH's aunt has already sold off considerable property in order to help her adult children, and has moved out of her own home, into a smaller new build, so her daughter and her family could live there. They are all well educated and earning well, but as she herself said, she doesn't need it, so felt it better her children should benefit now, rather than wait until she dies. Hardly surprising they have a lovely close family, while MIL prefers to trade 'help' for control. Which is why we will probably never see a penny. And that's fine by me.

I suppose my mum is in the situation you talk about, she lives alone in a 4bed semi, my brother is a family of 5 and live is a small 3 bed semi - but mum and dad worked extremely hard to get the house they now have extending it to get a 4th bed and very large downstairs - but heres the crux - she can't afford to move - can't afford the searches, solicitor fees that are all tied up with moving - also as bungalows are so very expensive once she has paid out she probably would have no money left in the bank.

Let me tell you why, while we help our kids out, we won't be handing over large tranches of our apparently "unearned and undeserved wealth".

My mum had dementia, it runs in her family so there's a high chance I'll end up with it. Care home fees at today's rates are £1k a week, that's £52k a year. What madness would it be for us to give our money away and have nothing left when we're frail and vulnerable? Who would look after us? If we both needed residential care our money wouldn't last long.

Erm because they worked for their house and tend to collect lots of stuff to fill it, don't want to downsize as they are stuck in their ways and enjoy their home? If you are being so judgemental, I will be..maybe don't have children you can't afford!

Only on MN do people's parents live in massive 4-5 bedroom detached houses, in RL all the people I know with adult children who haven't already moved are in the same sort of 3 bed terrace that their children may one day be looking to move to.
For many downsizing is an option, there are very few 2 bed or even 1 bed houses around, unless the idea is once parents cease to be any use to their children, by raising them, housing them, feeding them etc, they are expected to shuffle off to some cheap dedicated oldies flats where they can live out what's left of their now useless lives?

Mythical O think my generation have it much easier than my parents. 6-12 months mat leave versus 6 weeks, paternity leave, more chance of flexible working therefore more family time, subsidised childcare places, afterschool clubs, greater flexibility with mortgages....I say all of this as a life time renter btw. We will never be able to buy any a dream home to pass on, but I don't resen t that at all. If anything it is as a result of us starting a family before we got on the ladder (which my dm said was very frowned upon in her day) that is the crux of it for my family.

Mythical Chicken are you seriously suggesting that 'paying'for pensions for people who have worked all their lives is abhorrent to you? You expect older people to pay for your life? Have you not benefitted from the NHS, schools, etc etc as a child paid for by the generations before you? You think grown ups should be provided for by elderly parents? Really? I am speaking as someone who has received not one penny from my parents as they are poor. Yet I've been to three russell group universities,paid for by MYSELF, bought my own home and have a guaranteed salary, I grew up in a council house and have worked and worked and worked from an early age. I now help to look after my parents. In my experience my generation, and this is my experience, produced a lot of entitled middle class degree educated people who have never learned to 'adult' when it comes to self reliance. It took me 15years in a very very stressful job to even get near buying a property. The expectation that parents provide beyond third level education is a product of sheer egotistic entitlement .

The main problem we have now is due to crazy house prices in certain areas the future for a number of children will be determined by what they inherit & whether their own parents own a house. It’s no longer enough to work hard & aim for a good job which is a shame as it reduces social mobility.

I see both sides as my mum is in a 1m+ home, but to downsize would be hard & she would still need to pay at least 700k incl stamp duty to be close to us & grandkids.

However some friends moved out of London to Manchester some years ago as they wanted to get on the housing ladder. My friends parents have a 2.5m property empire, not through hard work but due to buying their house 40 yrs ago & inheriting 2 properties. They have not helped my friend at all & now as they are getting older all they do is complain that said daughter lives so far away & doesn’t visit weekly. Why should she?

Bumper1969, please don't take my comment out of context, it was in relation to a previous post by someone else.

You are very lucky to go to THREE Russell Group universities. How do you think you'd have fared if you were not blessed with brains? You are an exception, most people couldn't achieve your level of success, in spite of working hard all their lives.

Also many older people are deluded if they think it’s fair to lump more & more burden on future tax payers. Why should they pay for services they are unlikely to see?