To think it’s very hard to live in the uk without inheritance or family money?

[Lifesucksthenyoudie]

Just that really. Social mobility seems almost impossible at the moment without a head start. I earn a decent salary (Dh doesn’t but that’s another post) but my standard of living is so much worse than my parents and my mother didn’t work until we were in secondary school and even then part time for peanuts. Nursery fees and mortgage alone wipe us out. I haven’t inherited any money (large family, no chance) and feel a bit stuck. Not after sympathy just interested to see if others feel a bit trapped. Why is our society geared up this way?

This is simply not true I know many young people, my own DC included, who are already moving up the property ladder and own ( or will own when mortgage paid) beautiful family homes in their late 30s. None have had inheritances. What they do have is a high level of education and the determination to pursue a good career.

I came from abroad age 18, and I live pretty well. I'm mid 50s. As soon as I finished university, I bought a flat and made sure I moved jobs regularly to increase my salary. Booked a nursery when I was only 2 months pregnant to ensure I could go back to work with minimum downtime.....

So, it might not be easy but you certainly don't need family money. You need an education and ambition

It’s tough to be in your 30’s atm.

In the last 10 years interest rates, energy, nursery and food have all shot up but wages haven’t.

I’m a boomer, I lost 9 years pension because Lloyds bank didn’t allow women to join the pension scheme until they were over 25. ( They expected you to have left by then).
My state pension age rose from 60 to 66 with 3 years notice.
Only half my flat rate pay was used to calculate our mortgage allowance.
Sexual inequality was normal and definitely affected women’s careers and wages.
I accept though that if you had a stable marriage you were fortunate.
Without dh I’d be very poor and I always worked part time after dc.

However my sahm friends whose dh’s left when they were 50ish were financially screwed in old age.
No proper work pension, small state pension and little earning power to rebuild their lives.

My dd works 4 days a week since having a dc and I’ve advised her to never give up work.

A lot of people seem to be missing the point.

Why should a couple both have to work in order to have a roof over their heads and have some quality of life, especially when their children involved.

It's baffling that in previous generations you could own a house, have more than 1 child and have the wife at home looking after them. Yes other things were harder- I get that. But it's now the norm for both parents having to work, orherwise they will struggle financially.

To these saying they worked hard, got a degree and saved up. How many of you had the opportunity to save up whilst living rent-free at your parents? Parents bailing you out at uni. Not everyone has that privilege.

Also, life isn't always straight forward. There's redundancies, unplanned pregnancies etc.

@fedupwithbeingcold but this was doable for you in a way that it isn’t now for the younger generation. that’s the point. The home owning middle classes are in decline FACT. Home ownership is in decline - the decrease has been rapid over the last 6 years.

@Pottedpalm what is your definition of a good career? Well paid as the only characteristic? And what do we think those who serve us in care homes, childcare etc deserve? My wonderful sister was a devoted nursery deputy manager, caring for other people’s children all day, doing unpaid work at the weekend and evenings to set up the nursery and make up crafts, prepare for special events. She was earning just above a minimum wage. No chance of home ownership on that salary and yet an essential and worthwhile career.

I don't doubt that you and your DH have worked hard. I also think it is possible to have a comfortable life in the UK without inheritance but it is certainly getting harder. In order to make much headway in sought after / lucrative professions often does take some background family effort and finances. Working hard doesn't necessarily make you very wealthy. Perhaps being strategic and "working smart" helps somewhat. There are still some people who are in very lucrative careers because of who they know rather than any innate and exceptional talent.

I guess that’s the point though. We deliberately chose well paying careers with good progression rather than something that we were passionate about, because we knew we wanted to own a decent home and live a nice lifestyle. Other people choose their career path based on different criteria. And that’s fine, but generally you can’t have everything.

As a 60 year old I agree with you. I benefited from free higher education, easily accessible healthcare and more stable employment. Childcare was reasonable and houses seemed very expensive when we first bought, but were far cheaper than now. Building a comfortable life and raising a family is so much harder than it was

It's not as simple as just who owns their home. I'm now at the age where I'm seeing a gap widen between those who:

• don't own a home
• own a home but have a mortgage
• own a home mortgage-free, because of inheritance (of whom I know significant numbers)

The gap between 2 and 3 is just as important as the gap between 1 and 2. Not having to pay for your house yourself means you can make very different choices, build wealth much faster etc.

Wait until your children realise that a lot of their friends have a grand more a month than them because they have no mortgage.

I own a home, with a mortgage, and I'm very grateful, but I see every day the difference between me and those who have benefitted from the sort of huge inheritances that will become more and more common for a certain segment of society because of the inflated housing market.

@HungryBeagle it isn’t possible for everyone to choose though, is it?! And we need people to work in care homes, nurseries, shops etc. I would like for our society to have less wealth inequality so that everyone who works can have a standard of living that supports them to have a happy, healthy life and not live in poverty.

Not easier around the world tbh. Just life for the ones without family heritage.

Well so would I. But I just dealt with the choices I had available to me at the time. I’d have loved to be a teacher, it was my dream, but I looked at the pay scales and decided it wasn’t for me. So I work in finance.

Do you not ever worry that if nobody chooses to do the jobs that are essential but poorly paid because they cant afford a decent home and a nice lifestyle, that the whole country will just be a bit shitter.

Imagine if the people that get clean water into your home all decided they wanted a nicer home rather than an insecure rental.

Plenty of areas really struggling to recruit anyone and it impacts on those of us with better paying jobs too.

I think it depends where you live. We live in an unfashionable bit of Scotland and one professional salary is enough to afford a nice house here.

How did you afford to buy a flat as soon as you finished university? Did you pay for it with education and ambition?

Absolute tripe!
The only person I know who doesn't own their own property has just left university.
I'm a midwife and all my colleagues own their homes.
Stats 66.1% of UK adults are home owners ( 2023)

I was in that situation and quit to start my own business. I have more drive and purpose, earn a lot more money (and pay less tax), and feel far less anxious because I have so much more control over my day and the people I choose to have in my space.

Maybe it's a sign for you to change something, if you're not happy where you are.

Of course that’s a huge worry, and as I said above I wish those jobs were better paid and that the people doing them could have a better standard of living.
But I am talking about me, and my decisions. I made a choice based on the opportunities available to be at that time. Again, as I said above, I didn’t want a poorly paying job, so I deliberately chose a career path that paid well and had good opportunities for progression. I didn’t choose to follow my passion. I can only make decisions for me, no one else.

Agree, or later.

My Nan is 98, my Mum is caring for her at 73. Nan has money that will be left to Mum, me and my DS. I'll hopefully have paid off the mortgage before Nan dies and therefore that is pension money, but not necessarily early retirement.

The only way we afford a house 20 years ago was buying what we could, where we could, doing up and flipping it then using that cash to buy a house to do a massive extension on. It's still not finished.

But basically not go out or do anything for years to get a deposit then buying a shit hole and taking risks there after. The problem now is we couldn't afford that shit hole today. Its gone up over 50%. The house we flipped to ten years ago doubled in price in four years. That's scary, really scary. There's no way on earth we could afford our house today.

Yes, my Nan has just died and my mum has inherited a share of her house. My mum is 68 and retired this year.

@laclochette
It's not as simple as just who owns their home. I'm now at the age where I'm seeing a gap widen between those who:

• don't own a home
• own a home but have a mortgage
• own a home mortgage-free, because of inheritance (of whom I know significant numbers)*

The gap between 2 and 3 is just as important as the gap between 1 and 2. Not having to pay for your house yourself means you can make very different choices, build wealth much faster etc.

Wait until your children realise that a lot of their friends have a grand more a month than them because they have no mortgage.

I own a home, with a mortgage, and I'm very grateful, but I see every day the difference between me and those who have benefitted from the sort of huge inheritances that will become more and more common for a certain segment of society because of the inflated housing market.

You are talking as if you know my kids financial situation. 🤣🤣🤣
Ds has owned his house with his gf for 6 years
He doesn't need to wait to realise that his friends have a grand more than him because, well, they don't! Renting has become more expensive in our area. Ds got a job at 16 and they put him through professional courses and fast tracked him. He has had several promotions so he was ahead of the curve compared to his uni mates.

Ds2 is a slightly different story but he had a successful apprenticeship and he is a grafter and puts in a ridiculous amount of overtime on a good rate of pay. His friends are in the same boat so there's no waiting to realise his mates have money either!

Both boys have ,I believe made positve choices compared to their cousins who are in their late 20 and 30s and looking at leaving home and finding renting is costing a lot more than what my two are paying in mortgages for lesser properties.
Mine children and a lot of their friends made good choices when they could and didn't need inheritances to get a leg up.

@Karensgoldleggings that 63% you quoted as a percentage of UK homeowners was for the period to 2018. Updated stats show that it has now dropped 50% - a huge reduction in numbers and a downward trajectory. So whilst your experience might be more positive, home ownership is becoming the exception, not the norm and is heavily concentrated in the over 55, so the percentage of young homeowners is far lower than it was.

No, the question is: why shouldn't they both have to work? They may not WANT to, which is one thing, but there's no god-given right that says people shouldn't have to work (just look around the world a bit)...

If you are talking about the expectation that children will have a more comfortable life than their parents, and their children more comfortable still. Then I think it comes down to economic growth.
There hasn't been a lot for many years and then there was COVID and lockdowns and "Rishi-man-with-no-arms-Sunak" throwing money around. That can't not affect the quality of life, we are all sharing about the same or a bit less each year. Whereas our parents or grandparents were sharing more each year. Look at the way quality of life has changed in China in the last 20 or 30 years people have swapped bicycles for cars.