To be jealous of older generations who were able to buy houses because their bosses exaggerated their salaries?

[HonestTealPoster]

Yesterday I was at the spa and got talking to a man who was older than me (I’m 33 and I’d put him in his early 50s at most).

He told me that when he was in his 20s, he and his friend were able to buy properties in the area of South London where I grew up.

Despite not earning particularly much at the time, his boss wrote a letter stating that he earned £90,000 a year! He openly admitted that he wasn’t earning anywhere near that amount but the letter helped him secure a mortgage. He also received £5,000 from his grandmother towards the purchase.

I’d heard stories about people being able to do things like this years ago but I’d never actually met someone who’d benefited from it!

I was genuinely gobsmacked. Imagine being able to get on the property ladder like that.

AIBU to feel rather envious of how much easier some people had it when it came to buying their first home?

Agree.
Your thread title implies that this was common to a whole generation. I'm sure it wasn't.

I bought my first house in 1985, DH and I bought again in 1989 then we bought the house we live now in 1998. We never exaggerated salaries and know nobody else who did. I worked always in the private sector but I can't imagine any of my employers being prepared to do this.

BTW I am not one of those boomers who will tell you if only you drank less coffee and consumed fewer avocados you could buy a property! I know that's nonsense. Houses were cheaper relative to salaries. I started work in 1984 on a salary of £7,500 pa. I had nearly a couple of thousand in savings so started house hunting the following year. By the time I bought my house I had had a good pay rise and was on nearly £9000. My first house cost £18,250 and I had around a 95% mortgage on that as I borrowed £17,500.

However, I think outside of the South of England it is still possible for young people to buy after a few years. DD bought a flat four years ago at the age of 27 and many of her contemparies from school and also her similarly aged cousins have got their own places in the last few years.

Absolutely those who bought in the beginning often did well but it pushed prices up forever more imo

@PerdreLeBleuthe banks are more risk averse because of the crash and the irresponsible lending prior.

@HonestTealPoster bought my first place in the late 80s and working for a large company this wasn’t possible - had to provide proof of everything from HR (personnel as it was then). Maybe if you worked for small firm someone might have massaged the figures but I remember my variable bonus not being considered.

And the interest rates were scary though (went up to almost 15%), which made the payments absolutely massive. Didn’t make any money and sold it a couple of years later when relationship broke down.

Next time I bought was late 90s and the only difference between then and now was the anti money laundering/ID checks came in late in the process whereas now they seem to do them up front.

No, he didn’t, although I’m perfectly aware that those things happened. I’m not sure why recognising that some people benefited from particular lending practices is being treated as a denial that others faced significant financial difficulties.

Both things can be true simultaneously. Acknowledging an advantage enjoyed by some doesn’t require pretending that an entire generation had an effortless experience of homeownership.

@Patatiipatataoh yes it’s absolute shit show but the gains some experienced are insane. Houses that were 50k ish in the 80s well over 1m now.

30 years ago is 1996, I was 17 in 1999 and got my first mobile phone and had the Internet at home at 15 so 1997.

I'm 43, I bought my first house at 22, I'd been qualified a month, earned 29k and could get 3x my salary on zero percent discount. They did however require my work contract and proof of income and outgoings, I bought an ex council flat in an appalling area. The financial crash happened 2 years later, it was dreadful. I made zero money on that flat.

The guy must have been closer to 70 for the story to be true op, also men notoriously spin lines to younger women and exaggerate.

Same
it was easy to get credit , open accounts pay in cash for big items

my brother had two separate credit files for many many years at two different address and he was meticulous about them never crossing over
one was his legit one that had a bankruptcy on it and he never ever applied for credit from it and just had a basic bank account

one was his bogus one that he kept perfect with a great credit score 😂

you definitely couldn’t do that now sadly

This was absolutely not the case when I bought my first flat in 1992! Not for me or anyone I knew at the time. My annual salary at the time was about £7500.

What you’ve described is fraud and it wasn’t the norm. I hope it never will be. To be jealous of that is silly.

We bought our first flat in London in 2008. I was earning £28k and DH (then boyfriend) was earning £18.5k. Halifax told us to write whatever we wanted as a salary 🤨 We stuck with what we actually earned (helped by a big inheritance), so we only borrowed what we could afford. This precise instruction from a BANK is what crashed the market in 2007/8! We knew plenty of people who used exaggerated salaries and were then also able to get 105% mortgages to cover stamp duty and moving costs. You didn’t actually need any deposit back then.

@HonestTealPosterthats the narrative on here unfortunately. I found it odd as I have dc and it’s definitely harder for them.

Yep!

This did happen , but tended to be when your job was a bit more casual/self employed but doing all your work mainly for 1 person - - I work in music industry and labels and artist managers all did this for artists in the late60s to early 80s

It was fraud but it happened hence the law changing….

To answer your question "To be jealous of older generations. . .boss exaggerated income" - Yes you can be (of his scenario ) and No, because it was a small cohort and not a whole generation
You can definitely be jealous of how much easier it was to buy back then cost wise to salary!!

I'm m older than the guy you met and didn't even know this was even possible. Absolutely everyone I know went down the payslips route.
I think this person was working with people who knew the loopholes, had money behind them etc. so it's mixed as there are still people with good connections and info these days.
The different practices available to some back then do seem unfair, and not just with housing, people definitely tried to cheat the systems including illegally like dodgy MOTs etc.

It was definitely a thing, I remember buying my second house in 1997, the mortgage advisor who worked for my bank asked me how much my husband earned and sort of nodded at me and said he could bump that up if I was interested in various life insurances etc. I agreed to them all and then cancelled at the last minute once the mortgage was secured.

My friend divorced around 22 years ago and got a self certified mortgage and stated she earned 3 times what she did. She knew she was getting remarried and wanted to keep the house she owned with her ex husband.

The problem with anecdotes is people do tend to exaggerate I think. Or misremember exactly what was happening. I was recently talking to a 17 year old about theme parks. He said I should “tell them you have ADHD and you’ll just get straight to the front.” His exact words were “my mum did that when I was 14 and we got walked straight to the front of every queue. It was funny because everyone assumed I was dying and kept saying to my mum how sorry they felt for me.”

You seem hellbent on arguing with me about my perspective instead of wondering where it came from. The word 'jealous' is not conducive to productivity or understanding of circumstance.

You put a lot of focus into defending jealousy for another era and circumstance when you could put this time into productivity to change your circumstance, if that is your desire.

You won't change my view by being pedantic and trying to convince me that you're not jealous despite your assertion that you are.

'They' didn't 'enjoy and advantage' in the way that you're stating just because that's what you've stated. They did something you feel you can't do and, as a result, have something you don't have and that is where the toxic 'jealousy' has arisen.

Just acknowledge that and move ON from it so you can do what you need to do to move forward.

That man's house doesn't stop you from getting your own. You're stopping you by wasting time and effort on things that won't serve you.

I have no personal investment in your housing situation. Just trying to give you advice as someone who didn't let others, or their circumstances, colour my life to the extent I have to post about it for validation instead of using time wisely.

Like I said, best of luck, and I mean that, sincerely.

Yes self certify was a big thing mainly for self employed people
the interest rate was a little bit more but they only stopped doing them around 2008

Yeah but I know someone who is doing that now. He's self-employed and has agreed with some clients to delay payments for work until a certain time, so that he can present evidence of a higher level of earnings for a particular time period than what he actually receives in order to be able to borrow more. There's also so much fiddling with cash in hand etc to dodge tax. It's not like everything is transparent now.

A few fraudulent bosses inflating their staff’s incomes is not the reason you can’t buy a house. It’s because our incompetent and corrupt politicians have done a bad job of building houses and have actively operated open borders for 20 years. If you increase the population by 10 million but don’t build houses, prices go up.

In fairness, you were pretty specific that your jealousy was sparked by the idea of fraudulent mortgage applications accepted by lenders.
I'm merely pointing out that one man's bragging and bravado about how he pulled a fast one and gained from it, is a very limited perspective.
Your man still had to pay the extortionate monthly payments he'd landed himself with, and many in his shoes weren't able to do it and ended up losing their homes and being saddled with a shortfall debt.
Neither of these situations represent the majority though, so there's no reason to be either jealous or pity the whole of gen X.

Boss : How much shall I put in the letter?
Employee : 25k
Boss : OK, so long as you aren't expecting me to pay you that.

His story is very unlikely to be true. Even if he did "lie" in this way to obtain a mortgage, the chances are that he has exaggerated and embellished this tale over the years.
YABU to believe that this actually happened as stated.
PS We bought a house approx 30 years ago and had to provide all pay-slips and proof of deposit etc.

@PhoneCasewhy does the OP have to acknowledge anything to you? 😆