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Original poster

Did you have any parental help when buying first house?

499 replies

forceofagreattyphoon · 07/02/2022 14:37

Obviously inspired by all the Kirsty allsopp stuff about buying first houses.

Did you have any help from parents or partners parents in any way?

We didn’t get any ‘direct’ money but were only able to save a deposit by living with my parents for very-low rent for 2 years. So technically they did help a lot financially with the process. A lot of people wouldn’t have this option so I am very fortunate and wouldn’t have been able to do it otherwise.

I’d say about 80% of people I know my age (late 20s-early 30s) have all had some form of parental help when purchasing their first house. Ranging from the whole deposit gifted or help with all the fees.

OP posts:
CrimbleCrumble1 · 07/02/2022 16:25

My in laws bought us a lovely living room carpet as our wedding present but no other help. Deposits were only 5% then which I had in savings.
We helped our DS by giving him a 70k deposit towards a 200k home.

irregularegular · 07/02/2022 16:25

No, but I'm 50 and DH is 60, so we are talking about some time ago.

I expect to give some help to our children. I recently inherited some money and invested it in property, partly so as to ensure the value keeps up with SE house prices, whatever they do!

PrinnyPree · 07/02/2022 16:26

Yep a £5k loan from FIL to top up our deposit (which we paid back plus 3% interest) and Mum put herself down as a guarantor for the mortgage. We also bought in 2013 when house prices were pretty much at rockbottom (in recent history)

We'd been renting for a few years but also my Mum let me and my husband (boyfriend at the time) live with her rent free for 2x 6 month stints in our early 20s when we were trying to get our careers off the ground.

We did tighten our belts considerably but that was easy when you don't have kids and both our incomes were slightly above average. Our rent in 2012 was £650 I suspect that same rental property is £1100 now.

We bought our house for £195k. If it was in the same state as we bought it it would be worth £350k now. I reckon the more junior salaries for people with the same experience as us (at the time) at our company has probably only increased by 20% in the last 10 years.

Kirsty is absolutley clueless. But it does give you an insight into the minds of some of the sneering "upper" classes. #notallrichpeople etc etc.

Shadappayourface · 07/02/2022 16:28

Nope, paid for my own way in life.

Echobelly · 07/02/2022 16:29

Not my parents, but sadly an aunt had died, without kids, when I was a teenager and left her fairly valuable property to us. We split proceeds from sale once we were all over 18 and I was able to buy a place with a small mortgage in my early 20s.

Were it not for that, I think my husband and I could still have bought our first place together when we did... but only because I had some proceeds from another property sale! But without that, it would have been a real struggle.

caringcarer · 07/02/2022 16:30

My Dad had 5 dd's and gave us all £5k each which was many many years ago and my first house cost £48,500k.

RincewindsHat · 07/02/2022 16:31

Yes, moved back home and paid £400 pcm 'rent' which was vastly cheaper than renting my own place and allowed me to save up for a house deposit. I bought by myself so it would have taken a lot longer otherwise, being on a single income.

HMG107 · 07/02/2022 16:33

No. I purchased my first home 3.5 years ago and saved up £20,000 for my half of the costs in four years even though I was only able to work 4 days per week due to disability reasons.

To achieve this I moved to an area with minimal demand for 1 bed council flats and was offered one in a few weeks. This meant my rent was really cheap, however, I did have to put up with hearing about my colleagues prejudices and the area where I lived.

RincewindsHat · 07/02/2022 16:33

It's always been something of a mystery to me as to how people can do things like find £70k to give their kids a deposit, or hand over £50k per child, etc. Where does all the money come from?!

SecretWitch · 07/02/2022 16:33

Yes. They matched the deposit we had saved. I will always be grateful to have been given that opportunity.

TreeLawney · 07/02/2022 16:34

Yep. They gave us the full 50k deposit. We are very lucky.

Crepusculum · 07/02/2022 16:35

I've just done some approx. calculations and in relative terms DC will need £100K of help to buy the same 2 bed semi we did on the same income multiplier of average income at the time. So just giving them what we had with 'no help'.

Fbawtft · 07/02/2022 16:35

Yes. My parents helped towards the deposit for our first house. And we have reasonably good jobs but had been renting (no option to move home) so it was taking us ages to save up enough on our own. Then 6 years later we received some inheritance and used it to upsize. Still have a pretty big mortgage but we wouldn’t have been able to do it without help and I’m forever grateful.

My plan now is to save enough to help my own kids when they want to buy. I just hope I will be able to do it.

Twobigsapphires · 07/02/2022 16:35

Nope. Got on the housing ladder with exh in 2002 aged 25. High interest rates and exh worked 2 jobs. By the time we divorced in 2012 he was able to buy me out and I bought on my own with a small mortgage.

Been married to second Dh for 8 years now and have just cleared our mortgage due to inheritance from his nan.

TreeLawney · 07/02/2022 16:37

@RincewindsHat

It's always been something of a mystery to me as to how people can do things like find £70k to give their kids a deposit, or hand over £50k per child, etc. Where does all the money come from?!
Lots of savings (high earners) & benefiting from house prices rises themselves etc (eg my dp bought a house for 170k which they sold for the best part of a million 25 years later).
ShallWeTalkAboutBruno · 07/02/2022 16:38

@RincewindsHat

It's always been something of a mystery to me as to how people can do things like find £70k to give their kids a deposit, or hand over £50k per child, etc. Where does all the money come from?!
In my dad’s case, he had taken voluntary redundancy just before he was planning to retire anyway, so he had a significant pay off plus large lump sum from his pension. He lent us £20, which we have paid back. In laws also lent us £10k, again that was from their pension lump sum. Both my dad and DH’s parents were high earners with good pensions.
Jijithecat · 07/02/2022 16:38

No. I lived with my Dad and paid him rent - not market rate but covered costs. I was working three jobs at one point.
DH lived in a box room in a shared house whilst working on a graduate scheme.
My DM did buy us a set of drinking glasses as a moving in gift.

galacticpixels · 07/02/2022 16:39

We're in the process of buying and we're using all our own savings. I'm almost 30 and have rented (student accomm, then various house shares, now an apartment with DP) for the past decade.

We're lucky that we've been able to save while paying high rent (€1700 a month). My mother doesn't even own her own house so she definitely wouldn't be able to help.

SamphiretheStickerist · 07/02/2022 16:40

Nope. I was not so gently ejected from the family home as I turned 17, as was DSis. There will be no inheritance and DSis spent a lot of her salary supporting DFs lifestyle - until she got wise to him.

DH and I had a 1 bed flat in the mid 80s, sold it the moment the housing slump ended and rented for a few decades. We bought again a couple of years ago, in our 50s. DSis will be looking to buy something small and cheap when she retires.

Waxonwaxoff0 · 07/02/2022 16:41

Nope. They couldn't afford to. I live in a cheap area though so buying isn't too difficult here.

HectorGloop · 07/02/2022 16:43

No but we were in the incredibly fortunate position that DH had just sold part of his business and we could buy our first house for cash. My DM has given my brother an early inheritance to help him get a deposit.

nokidshere · 07/02/2022 16:45

None at all. But we bought our first house in 1985 for 28k with a 5% deposit and We sold it for 98k 13 yrs later. We used that as a deposit for the house we are in now.

Sadly MIL died 4 yrs ago but it did mean that we could pay off the mortgage a few years early. Because of that I won't need to charge my sons, one in his first job and one just about to finish uni, rent to live here although they will pay a share of the utility bills and food shopping.

Hopefully that will mean they can save faster.

CrimbleCrumble1 · 07/02/2022 16:46

RincewindsHat

It's always been something of a mystery to me as to how people can do things like find £70k to give their kids a deposit, or hand over £50k per child, etc. Where does all the money come from?!
I inherited some money, my DS was living in a shared house with some real scum bags. He was furloughed and having suicidal thoughts. I decided to use the inheritance money to set him up. Seeing him happy and settled is priceless.

FilthyforFirth · 07/02/2022 16:48

Yes, DH grandfather left him £25k and we used the whole amount in 2015 to buy a house in London. We would have got on the ladder eventually on our own as we both earn over the national average, but would have taken longer and probably would have been a flat not a house.

I do worry about my 2 boys, but DH and I will be inheriting a fair amount from 4 lots of parents (as both sets divorced) as well as grandparents, with usual care home fees caveat, so hopefully we can use that to help them.

CurzonDax · 07/02/2022 16:50

I'm mid-30s and got an inheritance 4 years ago. The sum (plus what DH and I had managed to save beforehand) enabled us to put down a 40% deposit on our dream home. As it is our dream home, there is no need to ever upsize, so we are incredibly fortunate to be settled forever.
The house was brought with the intention to start a family (which we are struggling to do). As the value has increased (and the mortgage sum itself is lowering, as we continue to pay it), we have enough equity to sell and downsize (to a nearby two bedroom), and buy outright. This is something we may do in a few years if we don't manage to have children.

We were living together, and managing to save (on two incomes) before this, and so would have probably brought by now, but we'd have been looking for the region of a one-bed flat, possibly a two bed with a rather large mortgage, so know how lucky we are.

I feel sorry for single people. It is harder to save with just one income, and obviously, two incomes means eligibility for a larger mortgage too,

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