All old people should sell up family homes for families.

[benigogo]

Not really an AIBU, more a hypothetical question really. This view comes up a lot on MN, and I'm interested in the detail of what people actually imagine when they say it. What type of property should they be giving up? What type of property should they be moving to? How old is old? What about younger people who under occupy a property? For example 2 friend couples, have recently downsized. Both from a 4 bed detached, one to a 4 bed semi, and the other to a 3 bed semi. Their homes were bought, one by a young professional couple, and the other by a couple in their seventies, themselves downsizing. If you hold this view what do you visualise?

If you are keen to move you need to monitor websites closely/ daily and register for property alerts and contact Estate Agents immediately before others have done so.

As you get older opportunities to make friends and support networks dwindle why should anyone forced out of the place where they have memories and know their community to be dumped somewhere new just waiting to die?

The NHS & care sector doesn't have the workforce or the resources to cope with the ageing population. Things are going to get ££££

Well said you and me both.

If a couple with kids wanted my house they should have bought it before me. If they cant afford it, they should have saved up before having kids first. 😁

@watersprites
"surely being in London you have significant equity?"
But why would I move away from all my family and friends?

We have converted bedrooms into an office, a den , a walk in wardrobe and my business / design room. no room is wasted. People ask us all the time what we do with empty rooms ? There is a couple who live opposite 2 bed no kids noone asks them what they do with their spare room ! . It does seem to be something to do with size of house .

I have a better idea, which is that young parents with more children than bedrooms, could downsize their family to fit their accommodation.
Just sell the surplus children.

I reckon there will be hot commercial demand from busy childless persons whose career leaves no time/opportunity for pregnancy and chestfeeding.. They'd leap at the chance to buy a ready-made child that's already toilet trained, big enough to help around the house, walk the dog, do a little ironing.

Downsizing from our three bedroom semi would necessitate moving into a flat. Bungalows are horrendously expensive where I live.

Yes what about the properly rich people?, will Tamara Ecclestone have to vacate her mega mansion for a 1 bed flat so some deserving family with kids can have her place? I’m guessing not, it’s just normal people who are expected to hand over the home they have bought and paid for.

@milveycrohn I'm not saying you should, it's just the "I can't afford stamp duty" argument is weak.

Nah. DH and I have recently made the decision we are here for the long term. Been here 20 years, and just upgraded the entire house, which still had all the original 1990's bathrooms etc. Anyway, 5 bedrooms, two kids, but one already moved out, and the other will finish uni next year.

DH has his bedroom, I have mine. We then each have a study/general/guest room. That's four rooms spoken for. 1 room is spare for DD2 when she comes home.

Big garden, which I love maintaining. Just about to invest in a greenhouse.

We are now late 50's, will be here at least another 20 years.

The problem with that is that they won’t buy a smaller property, they will rent one so then there’s a shortage in council flats, & bungalows.

It's not practical is it.I'm 74 and live in a modest scruffy 4 bedroom ex development corporation house which I own. Twice I have had children return and my eldest daughter currently lives with me.The grandkids come to stay and being a family with lots of interests the place is busting at the seams. I still work, 5 minutes from my home.I don't drive and its very convenient for everything. Now in some ways, I'd love to move, the place is a lot to look after.Its not worth much and what with moving costs I imagine I could end up worse off, financially.Also I have decent garden here and pets.

I don't think moving is going to happen!

£1.2 million in so far
2 relatives each in own home
another just diagnosed and so expecting another £600,000

its £7k a month towards the end for home in the north

We live in a seven bedroom detached house, with a separate two bedroom cottage, so nine bedrooms in total, in six acres of land. We have four teenage children at home and parents/family/friends that come to stay and so we use all the space occassionally but certainly not all the time.

I can't wait to downsize. The maintenance of the property is immense and we both work fulltime. I am tired of living in a house that never looks as good as it could because something always needs cleaning, fixing, repainting, mowing or weeding. I yearn for my first one bedroom flat in London that I could clean from top to bottom in an hour!

My concern is how much to downsize. Assuming at some point the kids all leave home, I would be quite happy living in a two bedroom flat with access to maintained gardens, but I also love the idea of Christmas at our place with enough room for all the kids to come back, with their own kids in time.

Would you plan enough space for one child to return to the nest if needed? Or all of them? How much room is enough?

I find this idea frightening and leading to very nasty outcomes if successful in taking root. You work hard for your home and no one has the right to force you out. I would defend my right to stay in my own home to the very end.

4 hours a day is very early dementia
need 24 hour at the end

If my olds were forced to sell up and move somewhere smaller, not only would family not be able to stay with them, it's likely the young family wanting the house wouldn't be able to afford the mortgage.

Rather than making people do things we should incentivise them. When an older person I knew wanted to downsize there were no appropriate properties in the area they and their children / grandchildren live.

They didn’t want a retirement village, just an appropriate size single floor apartment or bungalow. The area is full of three and four bed “family” homes. Provide the right options and people will move. Instead of which there are just expensive McCarthy and Stone type places.

Me three. We bought the house we wanted, and could afford. Families with children were as free as anyone else to put an offer in it for had they wanted it.

Those who consider that selfish are more than welcome to continue to do so. I’ll continue to enjoy my house and not give a shit.

Nope. I've been called selfish a few times. And a comment right above yours says...

From my real life observation it tends to be married happily childless career couples who are hoarding 3/4 bed 'family' houses even though its just the 2 of them (and maybe a pet) and they have no plan to have anyone else live there at any point.

100 % this , well said @TakenRoot

It's not really an issue of the number of bedrooms for me. I think this would be more realistic if there were plenty of one bedroom bungalows with gardens. I don't want to go back to living in a flat with people stomping above me, I'm more likely to want to use the garden even more as I get older. I think my 3 bed semi is worth a fair bit less than the 2 bed bungalows round here so it's not even v affordable to downsize.

😂😂Brilliant! And if the children prove satisfactory, they could be given the option of staying on in the house as future carers when the householders get old and infirm-thereby assisting with the housing crisis and the care crisis.

what bout if they have family regularly staying with them?