to be scared when kids leave full-time education

[spanieleyes22]

So I'm currently eligible for Universal Credit with 2 children over 16 but in full-time education. But when the youngest turns 20 I believe I won't be eligible for it any more. I don't know how I'm going to pay my rent or survive without it. They will still be living with me and will be in university (hopefully). What do people do when this happens.

Lol at the woman who said she had it hard too, despite inheriting a whole house!!

Sorry OP the cost of living is awful, wages are so low compared to expenses. I think looking to downsize of getting a lodger on are good ideas actually. My Mum moved to a 1 bed flat after I went to Uni and I just found full time accommodation and made my own way, not all students spend the holidays living with parents

Also OP most young people are skint and they're going to spend quite a bit of time sleeping in shared hostels/air mattresses etc when they travel and/or bunk in with mates! They might even have a roommate at uni to reduce costs.

Their own bedroom each is really not a necessity. They're not going to be out on the streets in an emergency if you have a one-bed flat. It'll be fine.

Not everyone can get jobs.You lot are so unsympathetic

at least one of the OPs children has already started their degree (possibly both have). That’s why people have been warning the op that she has been claiming a benefit she is not entitled to if she’s in receipt of the child element of UC. She’s misunderstood the rules about qualifying education.

There's going to be 3 adults who could work living in the house though...

I’m assuming you know OP that if your youngest goes to Uni (like your eldest) you won’t be able to get child benefit as it’s considered advanced education.

Ive just spotted others have commented regarding UC aswel.

OP, if you do downsize to a 2 bed home , don’t get an open plan place.
My house has 2 reception rooms downstairs. I have a sofa bed in the smaller one which my young adult DC stays in when home.

The OP has alternated between mentioning her kids are uni hopefuls, to saying that both are in uni, to only mentioning her daughter coming home. I don't know the truth but really it doesn't matter.

They will still have a home to return to if she downsizes and as @wubwubwub pointed out once they graduate they will both be working adults, so can contribute towards rent if they want a bigger place with the OP.

We have property investments abroad and savings.

And DH is an experienced professional, he will find another job. I just do PT work.

DC will live with us and save up for mortgage (if their job is in the same city).

They sell up and move in with their elderly mother😞

It’s because I have autism and chronic fatigue before I’m shouted at!!

It’s pretty rubbish that benefits stop when they go to uni. I believe that in Scotland this isn’t the case.

Eh?
The OP has nothing to sell. She's renting. That's the whole point of the thread.

The answer is for all the ‘middle earners’ to stop voting for the same party who have been sucking the country dry for the past 15 years.

Low earners have been dealing with being crushed into the ground since the days of bedroom tax etc and now it’s effecting more and more people and those people are looking at a bleak future if things carry on the way they are going.

Don’t let it carry on. Vote differently and maybe the country has a chance of recovering within the next decade before op retires.

The Conservatives never had a clue/care about the economy, a lot of it has all been about funnelling money and contracts to friends.

ITV had a report the other day about how 55 homeless children, mainly babies, died unexpectedly in temporary accommodation in past five years. 55 in the U.K. in the 2020s! There shouldn’t be homeless children let alone ones dying.

@whiskeydistillery

you are very privileged

surely you can recognise not everyone is as privileged
and would need to charge their offspring rent

I know you are not homeless, but maybe speak to someone at shelter, who might be able to help you work out how you are going to afford things moving forward.
Some Councils also have similar departments.
Maybe try Citizens advice to see if they can send you in the right direction for some advice.
Some employers have a free service for their employees which might cover this advice, or where to go to get some help to plan, or find out what you might be entitled to.
https://england.shelter.org.uk/what_we_do

Ultimately, no one wants you to worry about this, see if you can get some professional help and advice

How do you know she didn’t have it hard before she inherited the “whole” house.She could have been older when that happened.

Honestly, and I’m NOT referring to anyone in this thread! but not everyone is capable of doing a degree, or anything similar. Sometimes it’s financial, sometimes it’s energy (I’d bloody love to do another degree, but Parkinsons leaves me exhausted), or other commitments, but honestly, sometimes people just don’t have that kind of brain. I worked with the general public for years, and was astonished by how many are thick. Not ill educated, just honest to goodness stupid!

Sorry. I know it’s something we’re never supposed to say, but it’s true! It may be a tiny % of the population, but we’re a big populace, so that’s still a lot of people..

My mum moved into a one bed flat when I went to Uni, before that I’d worked and rented a room from her while I saved. I ended up living there after Uni for a few years while I saved a deposit for my first flat, slept on a fold out bed in her living room. Far from ideal, and made dating, erm, interesting, but we were skint and needs must.

Well said.

A lot of posters here are spouting the Tory rhetoric that’s fed to them -
… that hard working people working full time and forced to claim UC (and still struggling) because the “living wage” is a fucking joke (and zero hour contracts are legal) are labelled lazy people who make poor decisions. If only they worked harder they could afford to live.

It conveniently ignores the fact that the country couldn’t function without working class people carrying out the lower paid labour.

So what if op’s account has discrepancies? Are we going to pretend there aren’t people in this country working like dogs but unable to afford any standard of living?

It says a lot about peoples attitudes to people caught in a poverty trap to use an analogy of drug addicts as a poster did above.

unfortunately I don’t think you can afford to run a 3 bed (?) home just to keep your children’s bedrooms free while they are at uni. I know it’s not ideal but I think your only option here is to downsize once they leave for uni.

if they don’t go to uni and want to stay at home then you’ll need to charge them market rate rent. I appreciate your prefer not to but at the end of the day you can’t afford to subsidise them.

At retirement age of 67 you will claim your old age pension and probably if no private pension you'll get Pension Credit on grounds of low income.

@TheSnootiestFox how did you afford a masters? Obviously you have had the hardest life and have worked the hardest and smartest so I'm interested

First off sorry and this sucks it shouldn't be this way, but it is for a lot of people. My Dad was single father, lost his business due to gentrification, had health problems, couldn't get a job having never really ever had one, finally got one at 55 only to be bullied out.

During this I lived at home, studied and worked, and then worked full time. I started to pay rent and a significant amount once I graduated, and started working but if would have had to do so while studying out of necessity if that was the rules then. After I left home he had to downsize (move further out and in one really horrid bed sit) several times until eventually he applied for an alms house which he now lives in very happily.l and fairly comfortably considering he is on min state and pension credits.

Realistically your DC will need to choose between staying in their uni accomdation all year, staying with you but in much smaller possibly one bed property or moving back home for holidays but working to pay for it and/or you take in term time only lodgers. And you will need to start looking at HAs, alms houses and any other rent capped accomdation for older persons many of which start at only 55 years old.

And just fyi I would never claim anything illegally. I may have mixed up some of the timings but rest assured I would never try to claim something I shouldn't as knowing me I would get caught straight away!! In fact I only realized I might be eligible for some help in the last couple of years when rent went so high and I was still sharing a bedroom with my son. I thought there was no way I would get anything from the state as I've always been independent and worked and supported myself I hate hate hate having to take help from the state I wish o didn't have to. I think it's common that people don't realize hard working people on fairly good salaries can't make end
Meet especially if you don't hav a partner

Maybe posters missed this comment from op.

She has acknowledged she will have to make some difficult changes .

It’s still an awful prospect and it’s understandable that op is scared and no doubt depressed at the prospect, and feels guilty that she can’t support her dc more as they transition to adulthood.