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Original poster

Are things harder for millennials?

650 replies

squidwid · 27/03/2023 08:18

Many of my friends don't own houses and they're in their 30s. They did everything that society asked of them and still they're not making headway.

I know so many elderly people that live in 4 bedroom homes worth £400k plus. Obviously there is nothing wrong with that but families should be able to afford those houses so things can move on. No one can afford to buy them...

OP posts:
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11
jaqual · 27/03/2023 15:45

I agree that goibg to ubiversity is a huge cost now. That was a real benefit to mainly middle class older people. Very few working class people went to university in the past. My newphew was the first in my family.
Life for able bodied straight young people from middle class backgrounds is worse. For some groups of young people life is much better now.
My disabled daughter would have got very little education if she had been born years ago.

IDontWantToBeAPie · 27/03/2023 15:46

sst1234 · 27/03/2023 09:01

It’s supply and demand. The population of this country was 56 million in 1980. It’s is not early 70 million. Try building houses, or anything for that matter, anywhere. And watch the nibmys come out with their placards. It’s not that complicated. You have an abundance of something and value/price drops. You make something scarce, the price rockets.

If the economic mismanagement and ensuing inflation in that last 3 years hasn’t shown this, nothing will.

Meh it's fine up north. Swathes of housing going up.

jaqual · 27/03/2023 15:48

Although you have a point livingdead, the terraced house we first bought and sold at a loss isnow worth £132000.

jaqual · 27/03/2023 15:49

Most working class millenials started work at 16 years old. My schools sixth form was tiny as most left at 16.

Cantkeepkeepingon · 27/03/2023 15:51

FrostyFifi · 27/03/2023 14:56

I think you mean oldest. The youngest millennials are around 30

Sorry yes I meant Gen X. Youngest will be 42/43 depending on the cut-off date you use.
I just find it a bit weird someone referring to friends in their early 40s and then bitching about Gen X.

Unless my maths is off kilter 40, 41 and 42 are early 40s

I know our education was fucked over but come on, it's not that bad!

FrostyFifi · 27/03/2023 15:55

Unless my maths is off kilter 40, 41 and 42 are early 40s
I know our education was fucked over but come on, it's not that bad!

I'm not even sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing with me at this point.

If you're early 40s and bitching about Gen X you're literally bitching about people you're potentially the same age as. They're hardly going to have had vast additional advantages for being a year or two older.

ColinTheCorgi · 27/03/2023 15:57

I'm 40, so an older millennial. Me and DH bought a house at 25.
Our wages haven't gone up much in the 15 years since.
If I was trying to get on the property ladder in the last few years we would really struggle to find something that we could afford.
I feel really sorry for the younger millennials.

It is harder for them.

BrainOnFire · 27/03/2023 15:57

@LindyLou2020 At no point did I say that people should not to have the right to live in their own home! Of course it must and should be the choice of the individual.

And you're right that this is a complex economic and political issue - we're in total agreement there. I realise that there are lots of reasons for the current housing crisis.

All I'm saying is that one factor (of many) that would help the situation would be if there weren't so many bedrooms going completely unused. Like in my parent's house where there are three spare bedrooms.

queenMab99 · 27/03/2023 15:58

I am a boomer and would like to downsize to a bungalow, but they are out of my price range, so I will have to stay where I am, my son is separated from his partner, so lives with me, then he has room for his children, which he wouldn't have, in a smaller house or flat. I resent the accusation of the situation being the fault of my generation for voting for the wrong people, all the people I know did not ever vote Conservative, I think we are still in the grip of the ruling classes and super rich, although it is not as obvious as it was in the previous centuries, we are being manipulated, to blame previous generations and immigrants. I have protested and struggled all my life for a fairer system, but now just live as best I can, doing what I think is right in my own life and circle of influence.

Zoopyloo · 27/03/2023 15:58

FrostyFifi · 27/03/2023 15:55

Unless my maths is off kilter 40, 41 and 42 are early 40s
I know our education was fucked over but come on, it's not that bad!

I'm not even sure if you're agreeing or disagreeing with me at this point.

If you're early 40s and bitching about Gen X you're literally bitching about people you're potentially the same age as. They're hardly going to have had vast additional advantages for being a year or two older.

I’m at the very end of gen x but obviously, being born the year I was had meant I’ve screwed the millennials 🤣

crossstitchingnana · 27/03/2023 16:06

Things are harder now. For all of us, property aside.

Unphased · 27/03/2023 16:06

LivingDeadGirlUK
if you and your partner are on minimum ( rising in April) you should be on £40,000 between you, should be able to save for a deposit in a couple of years, if not sooner if you really try,
I could only dream of £9.50 an hour, YTS was £16-20 a week, if memory serves me right

IDontWantToBeAPie · 27/03/2023 16:08

Zipps · 27/03/2023 09:05

My dps definitely had it easier. Mum hardly worked, big house, good pensions. They were given family money and inherited in their late 30's when the money was actually useful. They are now late 80's and have barely used that money to help family. So one of the issues is old people hoarding money and then paying IHT.
All wages need to go up but if they do will those millennials stop consuming so much more than they need and save up for a house? I do feel for them but they want to blame everyone else and don't take any responsibility. If I or someone else offers ten solutions they will have a hundred solutions why they can't.

We're not all frittering it away you know. DP and I earn combined £98k a year. We're 27 and have saved £58k in the bank.

We can only get a mortgage of £490k. We live where a 2 bed flat costs £700k.

See how we still can't afford a house? Work is also location specific.

Blossomtoes · 27/03/2023 16:11

YTS was £16-20 a week, if memory serves me right

It was worth a lot more. Inflation means £1 in 1983 was the equivalent of £4.31 today.

jaqual · 27/03/2023 16:12

£98k! Dp and i are on our fifties and have a combined earnings of £51k and we both work full time.
Loads of middle class young people complain about things without realising how most people live.

midgemadgemodge · 27/03/2023 16:13

Things on average like buying a home are harder than in the recent past

Things like going on holiday are much easier

But rather than blame boomers , focus instead on making it better

Blame takes no one forward not least because on average half the boomer population never voted for the problems we have made as a society as a whole so you end up going round in circles

We clearly need more affordable homes. In the past home ownership was very rare but good clean mould free homes for life at affordable rents were easy to get

To pay for that
We need wealth redistribution- that's mostly from the top 10% but probably also from the next few brackets in terms of inheritance taxes

We need to work out how to manage an aging declining population
We need to work out how to manage climate change which includes migration /immigration
Both of these could be solved if we valued caring for each others above material wealth

whilst we blame others and bemoan our current lives we don't fix anything

The generation before the boomers had the Second World War to cope with , the boomers suffered rationing but they rebuilt better

IDontWantToBeAPie · 27/03/2023 16:17

@DizzyRascal as a younger Millenial (did GCSE in 2011) I've never received a word of career advice either. No meetings or advice, nothing.

Badbadbunny · 27/03/2023 16:18

Blossomtoes · 27/03/2023 16:11

YTS was £16-20 a week, if memory serves me right

It was worth a lot more. Inflation means £1 in 1983 was the equivalent of £4.31 today.

But that's still not equivalent to today's minimum wage.

I started on £32 per week in 1983, less than a pound per hour. Inflation adjusted that's only £4.32 per hour, less than half the current NMW.

Blossomtoes · 27/03/2023 16:20

Badbadbunny · 27/03/2023 16:18

But that's still not equivalent to today's minimum wage.

I started on £32 per week in 1983, less than a pound per hour. Inflation adjusted that's only £4.32 per hour, less than half the current NMW.

Show quote history

NMW is £4.31 a hour for under 18s, ie YTS age so it’s exactly the same.

IDontWantToBeAPie · 27/03/2023 16:21

jaqual · 27/03/2023 16:12

£98k! Dp and i are on our fifties and have a combined earnings of £51k and we both work full time.
Loads of middle class young people complain about things without realising how most people live.

... it's not my fault you don't earn more? We both have multiple degrees (MA, BA, BSC, MBA) and professional qualifications in specific fields.

The point is our area is so expensive that even with saving a small fortune and getting a mortgage for a high combined salary it doesn't reach the total needed for a family home!

IDontWantToBeAPie · 27/03/2023 16:22

jaqual · 27/03/2023 16:12

£98k! Dp and i are on our fifties and have a combined earnings of £51k and we both work full time.
Loads of middle class young people complain about things without realising how most people live.

Also my dads an electrician and my mum works in a shop. I'm working class. I've just worked my ducking arse off.

Hillarious · 27/03/2023 16:26

What am I being blamed for? With no work available in my home town in the north of England, I moved to London for work in the mid 80s. Eventually, I bought a two bed flat in London for £80,000 in the late 80s with two friends. We had a 100% mortgage, but were paying interest rates of up to 18%. Because of personal circumstances we had to sell when we had negative equity and cover over £20,000 of losses. That was around the time I met DH, who managed to buy a flat for around £60,000 on 3x the income of an admin officer, which doubled in value by the time we sold it five years later. That enabled us to move out of London into a two bed semi with our children. I had to give up work because of childcare costs and didn't go to work until the youngest went to school. Money was extremely tight, but we've now put three children through university (on tuition fee and minimal maintenance loans) and find ourselves almost having paid off the mortgage and with final salary pensions due in a few years' time. Our semi is worth eight times what we paid for it, but downsizing would involve us moving a long way away from the community we're a part of and who will hopefully provide some support for us as we get older, as we've supported our older neighbours in recent years. My children can't afford to buy where we live, so won't be settling down anywhere close to us. I didn't vote for Thatcher. Didn't vote for Brexit. What have I done wrong?

MidnightMeltdown · 27/03/2023 16:27

squidwid · 27/03/2023 08:18

Many of my friends don't own houses and they're in their 30s. They did everything that society asked of them and still they're not making headway.

I know so many elderly people that live in 4 bedroom homes worth £400k plus. Obviously there is nothing wrong with that but families should be able to afford those houses so things can move on. No one can afford to buy them...

Not sure who you hang out with, but I'm also a millennial in my 30s, and I literally do not know one single person in my age group who hasn't bought a house. Even the ones without a good education have managed it.

HoneyBeen · 27/03/2023 16:44

Porridgeislife · 27/03/2023 13:26

There are very few parents of the boomer age bracket who would be keen to have their son and daughter-in-law living in their front room for possibly years to save up the £30-50k required for a deposit.

There is no such thing as cheap rent or a cheap house unless you substitute it with huge commuting costs.

These things are out of the reach of most people on typical starting salaries due to the multipliers involved in purchasing or renting.

Show quote history

You misunderstand.
You lived singly with your respective parents until your wedding day.
Prior to that, when you decided to get married, you saved hard for a home.
When you married, you moved into your home.
Usually, most things in that home was donated by our mothers, such as bits of kitchenware, towels and bedding, furniture you bought second hand, apart from your bed and dad's usually helped out with the d.i y etc.
No one that I knew started off married life living with parents.
Then once you had established your home, you started a family, usually within around 3-4 years after you married.