To think if you meet your partner young, it massively impacts your housing situation?

[BumblingAlonggg]

Just idly thinking of my friends who met partners at uni, or quite quickly after graduation. I can think of quite a few couples who met young, spent a couple of years seeing each other and moved in together between maybe 25 and 28.

In one case, two of my mates and their partners all living in a (large!) 1 bedroom flat in a pricey part of East London, they shared for a few years and were able to save very efficiently.

When I compare to myself, who didn't meet a partner until later and spent all my twenties and early thirties in house shares, it just feels like it is a massive advantage to meet the person you love young, in terms of stability and being able to save.

And it's really just down to chance when you meet somebody you fall in love with where those feelings are mutual, so not a lot you can do to hurry it along!

Anyone else think this too?

It doesn't make as much difference as salary really. I met DH in late 20s, we lived in separate house shares until we moved in together at age 33 so not very young. But he's a high earner so we could still save a good deposit and buy in London zone 1. No family help or inheritance and generally frugal living (no cars or frittering cash). Lots of friends still can't buy despite having met as teens, because they earn much less and spent more on rent because they moved out of flat shares into a rented flat just for the couple.

I mean like you also could found extremely cheap overcrowded above the rules sharedhouse. There are plenty.

I agree with you in general, but have to admit thought you meant very early 20s when I read title, BUT this example is not great at all.

I didn't meet dh until I was 29. I had bought a flat in London a few years earlier (in the late 1990s) and let out the other bedroom until dh moved in with me. My parents acted as guarantors for the mortgage. I sold the flat at a profit when dh and I moved out of London.

There is a massive advantage of having a partner at young age, period.

Having the support by your side, where as single people have hype themselves up and find a readon to go on.

I don't recognise this at all. Pretty much nobody I knew had a long-term partner at a young age. They all had fun single lives and nobody got married until their 30s, except one friend of dh's, who married young and divorced a few years later.

I think you are right in the current circumstances where it is so difficult to get on the housing ladder as a single person. However the people I know who are in the best positions now are those who got on the property ladder by themselves at a younger age, then met their partner when older so both had property with equity in it, sold both and bought a massive house together...

I think there’s lots of factors but having 2 people earning and saving together makes a difference, buying as soon as you can, especially if there’s no child in the equation yet.

I say this as I met DH when I was 19 at Uni in our home country (which is a third world country). He came here for a one yr masters degree, came back home, we got married decided to migrate here when I was 24. We definitely started from the scratch as we had no money, no help from parent, no family support and still none as some live in our home country and some have migrated to other countries but none in the UK.
From age 24 to 27, I had DD1 and did a masters degree as well which we paid for as can’t get a loan when on a visa. So basically, I was working and studying, we were paying full childcare and my uni fees but because DH had a good job in healthcare, we broke even , though had zero savings and we were wise enough to not add another child to the mix.
Studying meant I got a better job at the age of 28, childcare fee has gone down to around 1/4 of what we were paying, we lived on the bare minimum and saved and bought a 3 bed house with that had a study and scope for expansion, just a month before I turned 30.

Now, we currently earn more than what we did when I was 29 (which was only 6 years ago) but I think not enjoying life in our 20s meant we now want to go on holidays abroad at least once a year, we have and run 2 cars, cost of living increase, house price increase, having another child etc and I say we can’t afford to buy our current house now if we hadn’t bought then.

I totally agree with you OP.

The brutal fact is getting on the housing ladder on 1 salary is a nightmare.

The fact is with 2 people you have 2 x salaries, 2x the people saving for a deposit, you’ve doubled the chances of one of the parties having family etc that are able to help towards deposit etc and you’re going to get a substantially bigger mortgage than if you’re one person!

Yes I know it doesn’t always work out that way for people, but as a rule you will get more with 2 than 1.

Yes, definitely if you stay together. DH and I bought our first house at 22 and the mortgage was paid off before we were 40. We then moved and bought a bigger house, but only had to take a small mortgage.

But we did "sacrifice" fun in our 20s for security in our 40s

Yeah I think that's a good way of putting it.

I mean like you also could found extremely cheap overcrowded above the rules sharedhouse. There are plenty.

Can you really not see the difference in overcrowding with people you know and love compared to moving into an insanely overcrowded houseshare with complete strangers?

I lived in some really dodgy flatshares because it was what I could afford, but had to have my own room, because it would not have felt safe to share a room with strangers. I didn't know any of the flatmates before moving in.

Honestly as a woman who had no say in who else was living in some of these flatsharing arrangements, there were times I felt pretty unsafe - really questionable male tenants who moved in after I did, to HMO style setups.

I did however meet some great new friends house sharing, so there are good bits too!

There can come a time when your friends pair up and move in together that the way things fall, you have to move in with strangers. It's a bit of an adventure for sure but there are some downsides to it.

It is very, very different to sharing with a partner or close friends...

Well done.

I spent years in houseshares. I am aware. T f I did make sure it was housesharers where we all vetoed newcomers. Well except the one where I had to leave after week because it was plain dangerous.

I am just not taking that 4 people in 1 bed is the best example of "massive advantage".
as I said I agree on some gental points, just don't think this was particularly the best example.

How did you save for that alongside years and years and studying?

I had bought a flat in London a few years earlier (in the late 1990s)

That's not particularly relevant now though. It's a whole other world!

I agree with you OP. I first bought in London, by myself, a flat for £70k in 2000. So that's fine, do-able by myself in those days. But with a partner we could have got something for £140k, which as house prices have increased over the years would have led to a huge increase compared to my £70k original start point.

I've never married so the 'meeting someone and putting everything in one pot' doesn't apply.

I totally recognise how lucky I am to have bought somewhere and feel for young people trying to get on the ladder now, with or without partners.

The change came when it suddenly became necessary to need the multiples of two salaries to afford anything, not just one. Right there, anyone who was single was at a disadvantage. Yes, people win and lose on the property market over the years, that’s just life. But anyone who is single these days is at a serious disadvantage, even when renting. If rental affordability checks state 30x monthly rent, in my city, you’d need to be on £45,000 to get a tiny flat.

Can I ask what you were earning in the few years between graduating and buying a house? Where were you living whilst saving for the mortgage?

True in our case. Met at 18, 19. Now going to be mortgage free at 31, 32 (well possibly may upsize so get another mortgage eventually, but we're financially comfortable!)

It was the opposite for us.

My DH & I met early 30s when both of us had been on the property ladder already.

When we combined our equity and salaries we were able to get a massive jump up the housing ladder.

But both of us had made sacrifices earlier in our lives to get shitty flats in shitty locations and slowly do them up rather than rent, so we were both on the property ladder in our 20s.

Roughly speaking, I think you are right. Of course there are other factors including parental help.

In my case it made a huge difference that in my early 20s I met and later married a man 10 years older than me, who had just bought a house when we met. If I'd waited 10 years myself, it would have been much harder. But in return, I'm part of his retirement plan!

Varies. I lived in a cheap hiuse share for years and the rent was less than 50% would have been for a flat with a partner. I saved loads.

On the other hand I'd never have managed to buy anything here alone. Ended up buying with a friend.

I know a few like this but it's been because the guy is earning much more. Without him the women would have had no chance of getting on the property ladder. There are definite advantages to being in a couple financially, especially when one is supporting the other.

Did the husband you mention you've been married to for 10 years on the compliments thread not contribute at all then? Given you bought the house when you were 26, presumably you were married then.

It's not that "you can't do it without a man" or any such nonsense.

All other things being equal, if you meet someone you want to commit to living with earlier in life rather than later or not at all (because you'd rather not live with anyone), you are likely to save more money in the long run by doing so.

Obviously as a general observation - not for all individual circumstances.

‘In one case, two of my mates and their partners all living in a (large!) 1 bedroom flat in a pricey part of East London, they shared for a few years and were able to save very efficiently.

2 couples shared a one-bedroom flat??’

my mate did this! One couple had the pull out sofa, but being in their 20s they were out all the time, working, travelling etc and all got on really well.
it allowed one couple to save and go abroad to and another to buy their first flat as the rent was split 4 ways…

It didn't affect my friends. We bought back in the Thatcher years as soon as we got full time jobs - you bought with a friend or even group of friends. I was lucky my parents have me my deposit and I bought a flat and got a lodger.
20 years on property was increasingly unaffordable so I had younger friends who would buy part shares, a decade older than I was when I first bought.
Anyway when i and my friends met our partners it was quite likely both had property, and even if shared still had made a bit, though there was a time if negative equity for a few so had to ride that out.
This was London, but zone 3 or 4, and not the best areas. One friend bought a one bedroom and had a lodger for the bedroom and slept in the livingroom for three years before she sold to buy with her partner.