To think being happy with a modest home should the norm?

[DinDinDin]

Obv it depends on where you live and your income etc but pretty much every person I know either lives in a big house or is trying to trade up a modest home to try and upgrade for a bigger place. Some of these people can easily afford it whilst others are overstretching themselves to make it work. AIBU to think we are all (myself included) a bit too sucked into this upgrade mentality anf the fact that we always strive to have more stuff? I am facing the (very fortunate) dilemma of deciding whether to borrow the very maximum I can afford and stretch for a bigger home or choose a more modest option and aim to pay off the mortgage faster and be debt free sooner in life.
Do you notice the same attitude with people around you?

I'll never upgrade my tiny 1 bed house tbh. Rather just pay off the mortgage early.

The UK has the smallest houses by sq footage of any country in the world, bar Hong Kong.

I think what we think of as "modest", the rest of the world would view as "astoundingly small"

I deliberately bought a smaller house than I could have afforded. One of my friends was downright contemptuous of it. But you know what? It's perfect for me. I had enough money left to furnish and decorate it as I wanted to, I can afford to heat it and it takes me two half days a week to keep clean. I don't know what I would actually have done with a four-bedroomed, two reception roomed detached house.

A lot of people in the world don't live in houses, as such. Some live in apartments. Some live in large family houses and have a couple of rooms per family. In some countries, whole families squash into a room.

This. We ended up buying a much bigger house than we needed(230 squaremeters) but a bit further away from public transport than we would’ve liked, for basically the same price because noone else wanted such a big house. I do think that we‘ll downsize at some point in 20-40 years but i really love the space and the tidy feeling/no overcrowding. There isn’t that much more cleaning because some rooms the cats and kids barely use and we have robots to vacuum and mop the floors..
i wouldn’t have bought it if it had meant financial discomfort though.

It depends on what’s important to you in life.
We wanted 4 children, all with their own double rooms and play spaces. We like to have spaces at home to host gatherings, workout (gym room), are passionate about music so have a music room where everything can be out.

We are not interested in cars, designer clothes, takeaways, going to bars/the pub etc. and we are happy to both work full time to make it happen.

I love my home and the space. I love that there is everyone here doing their own thing (TV, having mates over, practising music, gaming, working out, kitchen, socialising) (kids range from 2yo to 18yo) and not tripping over eachother. There is always somewhere you can be alone to relax, or places to socialise together. The older kids can have tons of mates over and it’s not stressful.

Mortgage will be done by 60 absolute latest (reality is, probably early 50s) and we will have the freedom to sell and help our children get started in life. I’m happy to take on a bit more now so that I can help them a bit further down the line.

I'm not sure that model of buying, making massive profit and moving up the ladder is as relevant today.

Us plebs should know our place, and not aspire to ay better, is what you are saying?

I’ve not thought about it tbh but actually, yanbu. I’ve seen it happen to family members and a few close friends. The financial stress has been apparent.

People do it for practical reasons too of course.

Our home is modest but it works for us, we’ve been here 9 years now and I can’t imagine moving anytime soon, more importantly, we can afford it. We also struck gold with the garden & I haven’t seen a garden the same size even with a bigger detached house.
We could sell up, look for somewhere bigger, an extra room would be nice & I’d like a bigger kitchen, but we would be overstretched and watching our pennies for the foreseeable. No more holidays or as many days out with the kids.
I don’t want to have live like that.

This thread is so depressing, early thirties - 2 bed terrace in the south east. We Could only dream of upsizing to a 5 bed detached. It would cost over £1M

each to their own I guess. We bought our first house in the early 90’s and extended it did it up and then moved and made good money meaning we had a tiny mortgage on our second house (which we’ve also fully renovated). We paid the mortgage off when we were early 30’s. It would have been easy to take another mortgage and get a bigger/better house but our house is enough for me. If it wasn’t big enough or we didn’t have enough space then I would. My husband would in a heartbeat but he’s a builder so I know it would be another renovation project and I’m so over living in a building site!

I agree. We could afford to go bigger but we've got a very affordable mortgage payment (15% of our combined monthly wage) and we like the area. We will need to do some work to it to make it suitable for our children to potentially be here in their 20s, but doing the work would be considerably cheaper than buying what we would create in this area.

I love beautiful houses but I've only got one go at this life, and I'd rather do other things with my money than just house stuff.

You're not wrong. I find myself occasionally pondering the same. However I give myself a good talking to and remind myself that in a few years' time my girls may well be moving out of home and it'll just be me. We have a 3 bedroom semi with a 4th bed garage conversation, I have quite a high mortgage from buying my ex-husband out recently and I'm in my early 40s. I'm only just able to enjoy being paid a decent salary and I want to enjoy holidays and fun days and trips with friends and family. My mortgage repayments go up everytime a fixed rate comes to an end, if I upgraded to a bigger place I'd be really stretched and to what end? More rooms to keep clean?! I remind myself of the things I should be grateful for. I have financial independence, relative security and own my own home. I want to build more security for my girls' future to help them have options as they get older and I want to enjoy myself as who knows what's around the corner?

People have different priorities OP.

You choose to live in an affordable house and pay it off- you do you!

MY DP and I share a modest home. We have a study that doubles as a spare room for visitors. One bathroom and a spare loo and basin upstairs, one cloakroom downstairs. We like to live quite minimally.

In contrast we have friends who've just retired and have up-sized to a five-bedroom house for the two of them. They have no children or grandchildren to accommodate. One of them has an enormous quantity of clothes and ballgowns (she is a ballroom dancer) so they've converted one of the bedrooms into a massive walk-in wardrobe for her. She also wants a sewing room, so has commandeered one of the remaining bedrooms for that purpose. The last two bedrooms are used for studies — one each. Plus a bathroom each. Downstairs they have a formal sitting room, an informal sitting room/ garden room, a dining room and a huge kitchen/diner/ family room with a large utility off it. I asked where guests would stay now all the bedrooms were repurposed and they said they don't plan on having people to stay. Last time I saw them they were planning to convert the garage into a spa/ sauna area with a laundry/ ironing room off it.

I agree.

Bought this house nearly 25 years ago and paid of the mortgage last year. 3 bed terrace, so mortgage free before I was 50. It wasnt always easy and had to convert the dining room into a bedroom at one point, but it was ok.

Along the way a lot of friends and family were obsessed with trading up and more than a few were quite disparaging that I didnt do the same. Except now they are a similar age to me and still have huge mortgages hanging around their necks, at an age when their kids are leaving home to uni etc One in particular all three kids left in 4 years and thanks to the market they cant sell their massive house so are stuck making ££££ payments every month on a house thats way too large for them, and it means that although they have the time to enjoy life, they dont have the money. Their bills are also astronomical so despite earning an absolute fraction of what they earn, I have a larger disposable income than them.

Of the ones who know I am mortgage free they have all said that they wish that they had stayed in their smaller homes to be able to do the same.

Dont be ridiculous. No one is saying that at all. I am certain I am more of a pleb than anyone else on this thread!

But why over stretch yourself to get a bigger house if its a want rather than a need? 1 bed flat and expecting triplets....yep move. 3 bed terrace with 2 kids? No need. Why take on a bigger financial committment if there is no requirement to do so?!

As I said above, I became mortgage free at 49 because I bought once and never moved. The day that the title registry thing came saying that there were no charges on the property and it was 100% mine was the best day of my life! I might be cold, hungry and on the bones of my arse, but I will always have a roof over my head.

I live alone in a two bed terrace. It's a decent size for a two bed and I have done the house and the garden up nicely, and added extra bits it like a walk in pantry and utility room. I sometimes wish I had a larger home, or lived by the sea or in a village, but then I remember I am 48, I have paid off my mortgage, I only work 4 days a week, and travel about 2 months over the course of the year either in my motorhome or abroad. Yes I could have a bigger nicer house, but my quality of life wouldn't be nearly as good.

I agree.
Do what you fancy OP, others will do likewise.

Each to their own, we have the smallest house of all my friends and family. Don’t get me wrong there’s been times I’d have loved a bigger house but now we have a modest mortgage with rising interest rates I’m relieved we didn’t upsize

To each their own I guess.

we have a house that is much bigger than we need (2 adults, 1 child in a 4 bed/3 reception). But I love it as we have people stay over at least once a month so a spare bedroom is great. I have a home office for wfh (with a sofa bed for when we have entire families stay over). And also a separate play room and dining room.

we could have a small flat a no mortgage, so more money to spend on holidays: but were not too bothered about holidays.

we will probably downsize closer to retirement to gift our son money for a deposit on a house (and help us retire at a reasonable age)

We’re in the north east and bought our 1st home for £67k it was a 3 bed end terraced. After 7 years we decided we wanted to move to a nicer area. We were looking for a 3 bed semi. Our house took a year to sell, then when we eventually got an offer and accepted (100k) there weren’t any suitable houses on the market for us to buy.(typically , some lovely ones came up after we moved). There was a 4 bedroom semi in an ideal street but it was £170k which was the top end of our budget. I was keen to wait but DH was worried our sale would fall through. Our mortgage at our first home was around £300. Moving to the new one even with the deposit it was £650 but it was affordable so we went with it. Then Covid hit and my DH pay has been reduced since then as he doesn’t get paid a certain bonus now. Our fixed rate on the mortgage recently ended so now our mortgage is £850! With the increase with all other general living costs as well I’m certainly regretting going for the 4 bed. The kitchen is older than me and we have no money to get it done. We have discussed selling and downsizing but with house price increases the 3bed semi we originally wanted are now worth what we paid for ours and with the cost of solicitor fees/a state agent fees/removal fees it’s probably not worth it!

Also we bought this house on a 5 year fixed rate mortgage just before the financial crash in 2008. So were stuck with large payments but not in a position to move. Swings and roundabouts because when the fixed rate we were then on was up in 2021 we could only get another fixed rate remortgage on my salary alone as my OH had been on furlough in the pandemic. If we’d been in a bigger house we wouldn’t have been able to remortgage just on my salary most likely and would have been hammered on the SVR

Why would you aspire to a modest house. Sure I don’t want to live in a classless McMansion but yabu to say it should be normal that people are happy with something modest. Which by definition is ‘relatively small or limited’. Sure if it suits you but you’re not even talking about being happy in an average home. You’re saying people should be happy in a less than average home and that be the norm. It’s paradoxical. Because ‘modest’ means less than the norm.

I would disagree in that "modest" these days seems to have come to mean "less than the best".

The idea that you can be happy with less than a big detached house with a big garden and garage etc, is totally unfathomable to some people. I know some, especially in their thirties, for whom my home would be a stepping stone. The eye is always on the "big house", its the prize. Bragging about the size of ones home seems to be so important. And yet when you get to my age (50+) all the people who chased that dream in their 30's and 40's are regretting it as they can't step back in their careers due to this massive debt they have to service. And they cant sell as the market is shit, very few people have the money to buy the sort places they are selling and the ones that do dont want to take the risk at the moment.