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?

I agree with the point you are making OP. These things are easy to say won't necessarily work in practice.

We could downsize when the DC leave home but we are in 4 bed that is well situated for public transport, doctors, shops etc. which is exactly what we will need when we get older. There aren't many good options to downsize to in the area as I don't want to lose having a garden. The other side of the equation is who is likely to buy our house - a four bed house in London is not going to be bought by a first time buyer and who will we be competing with for the smaller properties bearing in mind we would be cash buyers.

Thinking of the older people I know who live in homes that are technically too big for them — 3 and four bed detached homes, sometimes in quiet areas with nice big gardens — where do you think they would want to downsize to? Flats, where they have to deal with the noise of having people living in close proximity? I visited neighbours who downsized to a two-bedroom flat in a 'nice' development near here and encountered a topless elderly lady in a corridor (she's developed dementia, has no family and there's no one to look after her) and the smell of cigarette smoke leaking under doors and into shared spaces. When I parked the car I could hear radios and TVs blaring from various flats. It was a hot day and the windows were open and it was really noisy. Why would anyone trade a quiet detached house for that if they didn't have to?

That policy would just mean that older cash buyers would outbid young couples on smaller homes. The younger couples wouldn't be able to afford the 4 bedroom houses the older people have just vacated, so they'd be in a worse position.

Makes no odds. We aren't lacking family homes on the open market, we're lacking accessible properties - ground floor flats, bungalows etc - for people with mobility issues.

If I won the massive Euromillions pot, I'd be setting up a construction company to specialise in the creation of 1 and 2 bed bungalows and nothing else. In an ideal world, I'd also set it up as a housing association.

There should be incentives offered for people to choose to downsize. I wish more people would do it.

I know too many young families cooped up in one and two bed flats who are unable to move. Families who have decided not to/postponed having any more children because they do not have the space. Meanwhile, where I live the catchment area of the local primary has changed hugely in the last 20 years because the area it used to serve, where all the young families once lived in decent sized family homes, no longer have any school aged children in them.

Even if they did sell though, the price would be totally unaffordable for most working families. There is a huge wealth gap. I know a family who had a very good sized house (both earn £££). They had trouble selling it, but in the end the people buying it are a young child free couple whose parents are buying the house for them as a gift in cash (well over 7 figures...). There is also a new development near me. I read in the paper that a couple had bought two next door townhouses for their primary aged daughters as an investment. They are 800k each!

Our property market, like most things, is really very broken.

I can’t see how anyone could make this work. We two, in our fifties, have a 4bed house which gives us a bedroom, a spare room and an office each. We both are looking forward to a retirement where we have plenty of money to pay people to do the things we can’t as we age, and can use the space in our home to do things we enjoy, rather than things we have to; both have hobbies which require space and protection from noise for our neighbours. No children, so we don’t care if we spend all our money on paying people to look after the house and garden and us, when and if needed. That helps the local economy, and maintains the condition of our home for the time when we do decide to sell it (which won’t be until one or both of us is dead).

Added to which, none of the families I know locally could afford to buy this house if we put it on the market. We would be taking up a smaller house that younger people could afford, and leaving our current house to be bought by someone from outside the area probably very like ourselves. Unless the people advocating for this measure decide to control market forces as well, they wouldn’t be able to make it work.

That’s Illogical. There is no shortage of large homes. Anyone who can afford one can have one. Making old people exit won’t suddenly mean folks who can’t afford them now can. It just means those old people with more money will drive the prices up of the small affordable homes.

But can families actually afford to buy all these newly vacated properties?

My parents had to downsize when Dad retired (aged 80) from a four bedroom house with a garden to a two bed flat without a garden. It was what they could afford. They really missed their garden.

Meanwhile, where I live the catchment area of the local primary has changed hugely in the last 20 years because the area it used to serve, where all the young families once lived in decent sized family homes, no longer have any school aged children in them.

This is a big issue, in London the rolls are forecasted to drop significantly. It's bad news as funding is based on headcount.

People often talk about this, it isn't a right actually own a house, it is a relatively new phenomenon.

But can families actually afford to buy all these newly vacated properties?

It depends on prices surely? A glut of supply may depress prices although I would be very conscious of taking on a big property as I think essential bills eg energy are only going to get more expensive.

Moving is a colossal hassle even when you’re young a fit - it’s no wonder if a lot of older people don’t want to do it, especially if they’re not rattling around in a 5 bed Georgian rectory with a morning room, tennis court, and room for a pony.

And they older people get, the less likely they are to want all the hassle, never mind the expense. I know of at least one very elderly couple who should in theory have moved somewhere several years ago, but they were already frail so someone else would have had to manage the whole thing for them.

Plus, I’m quite sure that the sheer unfamiliarity of everything in a new home would have thrown them - even things like a different oven, taps turning a different way, and the loo in the ‘wrong’ place, would hasten their decline - when with everything so long-familiar before they were managing pretty OK.

People often talk about this, it isn't a right actually own a house, it is a relatively new phenomenon.

So what should young people do? Why should they pay more in rent than a mortgage? It's not a right but society depends on a contract. The UK hasn't invested in young people & now we have less of them & more will emigrate I'm sure.

Now people can even live in their own homes in peace?
Jesus!

Can younger families even afford these houses?

I don’t understand this who deserves this and that thinking at all.
If you can’t find/afford big house, stop having so many children, no one need multiple kids.
So what if two people, hell even one person wants to live in a big house?

Op is beyond stupid.

What age?

Who decides?

No…we need more suitable housing.

Also many older people DO want to downsize, but go where? My parents live in a cheap but ‘sought after’ area, train station, great transport links, near a park people travel miles to get to, loads of schools, good shops but they have no other savings or investments and bungalows here are around x2 the value of their current home. Their only hope is an old council bungalow which go quickly but cheapish and usually have endless repairs

I did read that the classic suburban 3 bed with off street parking/garden will become very in demand as downsizers will want them and growing family as there isn't enough supply near amenities.

Did you read it though?

I believe in capitalism so if one person is able to buy a bigger house than another that's absolutely fine. As for what is "too big" just depends on the individual. We bought this 5 bed in part because we have 5 children and also because I have worked fro home since the 90s as did. Today for example 3 of us are working from home here n 3 separate rooms - in fact in a 4th room too earlier as I had clients here for a meeting. I hope to work until I die so I don't really see me needing less space. Also a big detached house with garden is in a sense buying a buffer to be away from other people on all sides.

The state anyway has chosen to make older people not leave big houses because stamp duty land tax is so high.

Op is beyond stupid.

the irony!

I don't think anything like this should ever be enforced. However, now that our kids are university age I am starting to think about moving in the next 10 years to something somewhat smaller. Not to a very small house or flat, but something more closely matching our needs and easier/cheaper/greener to run than our current rather large house and garden. In an ideal world, it would be a self-build to get just exactly what we want, but in practice they may be a challenge. It would release funds to help our children to buy bigger homes of their own. Seems to make much more sense than us sitting on it all!

As I said, I don't think it should be enforced. But I do think that taxation should probably shift towards wealth, including that held in homes, which might help to encourage it.

I don’t think OP is saying old people should move, but asking how people who say old people should move support their opinion.

I’d say it can work, though only if the old person genuinely wants to and hasn’t been pressured or emotionally blackmailed.

Even then a house move is massively disruptive, and adjusting to new surroundings can be perplexing. Leaving neighbours and friends they used to see every day may be much more of a loss than expected.

One of my relatives moved to a fantastic retirement home in her late 70s. A comfortable one-bed flat in a block with cafeteria, library, common rooms and all kinds of services and leisure activities organised. She had a great time till dementia started in her 80s. Now she lives with her devoted daughter and son-in-law who luckily have a big house.

One of my in-laws, a healthy and fairly active woman in her 80s, was forced out of her home, under moral pressure from her offspring. She moved to quite a decent home but went downhill fast and died within the year. A very sad end to a harmless life.

DH and I are planning to downsize; we want to move to a bungalow before we start having problems with stairs - but there are very few bungalows round here. No-one is building new ones, and the ones that do exist are rapidly being extended, usually by having an extra storey added.

No. There is a huge shortage of families homes.

To the point where it is affecting fertility rates. More homes = more affordable.

Its not that simple though is it my mum.and dad both 81 live in a large four bedroom semi just the two.of them its in s nice village and house prices have sky rocketed even in the Northwest many young families wouldn't be able to afford their house even if they were selling
My mum is very disabled now so they just live down stairs they have turned what was their dining room into a bedroom and they have a downstairs toilet and shower room anyway ( as well.as a bathroom upstairs ) i.would love the room they have.