AIBU to be annoyed that they have such a great life

[HFJ]

Young adults - they earn decent wages, continue to live in your home/‘hotel’, seem to only work part time (because ‘work life balance’), go on lots of holidays, go out for meals, buy nice clothes, zoom about in their brand new cars, eat all the food including the posh sausages, and believe in the loo roll fairy.

The irony is that this is what I hoped to provide, given the miserable start to adult life that I experienced. Work ethic, frugality and hope for a better future saved me.

But wow, thanks to working hard, I get to work harder: no downsizing, weird awkwardness as multiple adults want to use the kitchen, sky high energy bills and always changing empty loo rolls (among other fun housework items). When you broach the topic of, you know, actually taking proper steps to adulthood, it’s ‘I just want to live my best life’

Well I just want to live my ‘best life’ too and that might include walking round the house naked, if I so choose. Except I can’t because the hallway’s busier than Clapham junction.

Sidenote: why does it seem to be the norm for their girlfriends to practically live with us parents of adult males? I already have enough mouths to feed. Also I had a different cultural upbringing: living together was a nice thing and you couldn’t have adult nice things without also having responsibilities such as worrying about the state of the boiler, or paying council tax. Aren’t there any parents of daughters out there wondering where their daughters have disappeared to? 😜

What could I hope for if this is, technically, what I wanted to provide? I guess I was expecting their gratitude, an appreciation that this easy life was not provided by the government, for example. I was expecting a rallying of the nature, ‘gonna save 100k and buy my first flat by the time I’m 21’

Tbf they do their own washing and tidying up. I know other parents have it worse. I also know that house prices are a major barrier to proper adult aspirations.

Is it also social media? Trying to emulate the cushy lifestyle of celebz?

Other mums seems to revel in having adult children, their girlfriends and someimes grandchildren living with them? Seems to be a kind of one-upmanship ‘Oh wait till they’re 28 and the darlings need to come back to live with you after completing a PhD’. Yes, that’s what I always dreamed of, clearly.

Would be keen to hear from parents who feel the same way?

I never wanted children so I remained child free. If I had them I would certainly have kicked them out by their early 20s to make their own way in thr world as I did.

I’m going to use HelloGoodbye92 example as a bit of a case study.

let’s assume it’s the 30yo who is making 40k and paying 150 a month in rent. Probably out of school for 8 years.

Will have worked up to that salary, so going to use conservative numbers.

30% on housing is 12k a year.
that is 1k a month
less the 150 leaves 850.

now, I said I would be conservative, so let’s round way down to 500 a month.

8 years, 12 months a year so that is 96 months. saving 500 a month would mean this person should have 48k tucked away.

now the food bill and misc expenses are probably also lower, so that conservative 500 is really way too conservative.

But still, there should be at minimum 48k sitting there for a house deposit by now.

Hi all and thank you for the replies. This is a problem without a solution. I am sharing for the mutual support.

A little context - the main issues are around step-children, not my own, plus I think a kind of infiltration of other cultures via girlfriends. My OH also experienced a similar, easy going start to adult life. No collective history of redundancy or bankruptcy due to recessions. It is difficult to get him to understand how uncomfortable I am about this invasion of territory, this place I have so carefully worked for and cared for.

However, the condition for all is that they are either studying full time (in which case, fully supported) or working full time AND saving. It was me that forced that, but it is not my place to say ‘Actually if you want to have this high life, rent your own flat with your girlfriend because she is here ALL the time and I cannot relax’.

How long will it go on for though? That’s the anxiety promoting thing. It is possible to save and still live the high life so why would they give that up. To them, they have a societal permission to take their time to ‘find themselves’.

The girlfriend’s parents don’t appear expect her to save. There seems to be no ‘careers discussions’. They probably congratulate themselves that she’s all grown up and gone to live with and look after a hairy-arsed bloke. She now tidies up and often cooks for him - how lovely for him. In my house, young men are expected to do their own washing and ironing because, as I’ve told them, they need to realise that women work full time and aren’t their skivvies. I’m in the kitchen stifling a look of incredulity as she merrily organises a dinner that undermines my messages about pulling one’s finger out.

To those who think I am a pushover: I was, at one point, making family dinners for everyone after I had done some long hours at work. I stopped that. I had a word with myself seeing them emerge from their world of instagram and plomp themselves down to a meal I’ve cooked. I did also audibly signal disapproval when a girlfriend came over wearing just crocs, knickers, bra and a dressing gown. What parents encourage that?

Oh another sidenote, what is this business with girls being the ones to own and drive cars and then be ferrying their boyfriends around everywhere, with said boyfriends not being arsed to get a driving licence? It’s probably confirmation bias, but because it happens here, I now twig how common it is in the local town. It’s like a fashion thing. The young couples are clones. A bijou girly car pulls up and out pops a blond haired, crop-topped girl and then a hulking hairy bloke with a footballer’s haircut extracts himself and just flumps along beside her.

I am turning into my mother and I love it!

OP from your update it seems the girlfriend is pushing boundaries a bit and annoying you. Can you put in place some ground rules about how often she is allowed to stay? Like not at weekends, or two nights a week or something - send them back to her parents place, see how they like it. So what if your kids kick up a stink - maybe if you make the house less comfortable for them to live in, they will be more inclined to move out.

Also, talk to your DP and tell him this is stressing you out and you want to make changes. The kids aren't going to change - why would they, it's a great set up they have going. So you need to get him on side - is downsizing something you both would consider? Maybe it could even allow you to retire a bit earlier. Think about what you would both like the next 5 years to look like and work towards that.

It is your time now to enjoy your life, not having to tiptoe around strangers in your house. Honestly, they all need a kick up the ass.

Chuck them out

You and the OH need to have noisier sex. Especially the more kids that are home.

Walk around in your knickers and bra of you want to.
Tell the gf "you we raised him so he could do that for you too, don't teach him to be waited on!"

The girlfriends are staying because you let them how about a no she can stay x y z nights and that's it you either want peace in your own house or not? And that's weird about the driving sounds like the boys just ljke to be coddled and looked after and that's the parents fault for holding a candle up to boy children 😳

And definitely talk to your Dp.

Your posts are brilliant OP, sorry I realize that's not the point!

Do we know how long they've been making £40k for? They could have had a recent payrise.

Assuming they have managed to save £48k, with a £40k salary the maximum they can probably borrow is around £192,000, on my understanding (4.8 times their salary). That gives a budget of £240k. If you're in London or the South East, you'll struggle to get a one bedroom flat for that. Factor in interest rate rises and the cost of living and the fact they will have zero savings left, and it looks a pretty bleak picture to me.

I do understand there are conflicting pressures here. Parents do not want their adult children with them indefinitely, and there is absolutely a middle ground to be struck. But the fact is the world is a very altered place from even 25 years ago and it is practically impossible for young people to make their way on to the property ladder without some sort of financial assistance. I'd hazard a guess that, if cheap and good quality accommodation was readily available, most young people would prefer to live in it. Who of us at the age of 25 would choose to be living with their parents, after all? I feel desperately sorry for young people.

Yes it's difficult for young people yadda yadda, but surely these adults living at home could show their parents and house some respect and contribute to their household.

We lived with family for 3 years (2016 to 2019) and were in London. I was a new immigrant(did uni in the UK) and waited 8 months to get my visa (got it in 2017 so could not really move out before that point). Then DH or I were between jobs, so we really only got 'settled' in 2018, by which time we had £70k in savings so could actually look at buying rather than renting. Being gazumped and finding an affordable property and transacting took another year.

DH was on £30k (with overtime) for the first year and then progressed to £50k. I was on around £25k. So combined £75k. We saved £90k in 3 years and bought a 2 bed flat in London for £392k in 2019.

4 years on, we earn £120k combined (he earns £75k and I earn £45k) so the mortgage is a lot more affordable than it used to be and we also overpay. we bought and moved out cos i thought we overstayed our welcome but now she told me the last time i saw her that young adults moving out are contributing to the housing crisis. And she keeps inviting us for lunch. Maybe she misses us. Lol.

Dh and i saved 90k in 3 years and bought a 2 bed flat in London for £392k despite being on low salaries for London (£75k combined in 2019). We went on holiday too and flew to Asia to see my parents. How do you know they aren't saving? We moved out after 3 years and that was taking into account that I had to wait almost a year for my visa which of course affected my ability to find a stable job from the start (I was working while waiting for my visa but its hard to get established when you don't even have a visa). And it took us another year to find a place to buy and transact. Plus time for job searches post university. So all in all only 1 year plus staying where we were comfortably earning (though even when it wasn't comfortable, we still managed to save).

This was during the time of low inflation though so it would be much harder now.

Agreed!

A lot of renters are being asked by landlords for guarantors who are home owners and earn 3 times the yearly rent even if they have stable jobs earning £50k to £60k each. My DH says that is understandable from the landlord's perspective as 50k to 60k is a low income. We earn around that amount (DH earns a bit more- £75k- but its not that much more than £65k when you consider tax rates) and we did manage to buy our own flat in London and would probably still manage to buy it today even with the interest rates. Though i guess if i was the landlord i would probably ask for a guarantor too even if such a person can afford to buy because the bank would not foreclose that quickly even if that person lost his job (and the owner has money invested in the property) but a tenant who is not invested in the property would likely stop paying the rent and then it would be difficult to recover lost rent monies.

But then that begs the question. How many jobs in London pay £80k or more to a 22 year old so that you can kick them out comfortably knowing that you would not need to be a guarantor with all the risk it entails. having them live in your home is risk free. If you refuse to be a guarantor, where would they live? I don't think moving outside London would help as landlords broadly all have the same risks (of non payment) and it is likely that they would still ask for guarantors.

Having worked hard at getting kids to pull their weight while I've been working and juggling 3 kids I think my DS moving a girlfriend in who waits on him and drives him around would be infuriating !

I do sympathise OP. We live in town and are often the house where teenagers stay over if they can't get home etc and I love that BUT working adults in full-time residence is a whole other thing.

My plan if we end up in this scenario is to take money off them for rent plus savings and only give them the savings when they move out. I realise it may be harder to execute in practice.

Thanks so much for sharing this, and congratulations to you and DH on the move :)

I think it's definitely more affordable if you partner up to buy something (if that isn't stating the obvious). I'm not sure where that leaves single younger people though. I'd hate for young people to feel they had to rush in to relationships so they can buy a property (I'm not for a moment suggesting that's what happened with you and DH).

Then you get the other extreme. My sister's son packed his bags and left for university at 18 and apart from that first Christmas, she hasn't seen him since. He calls occasionally, usually on the ear for money, and then disappears into the ether for a year or more.

We had coffee the other day where she confessed her disappointment, and admitted that if she had her time again she wouldn't have bothered with him.

She has a totally different relationship with her daughters; with photos of them all over her lovely house but not one of her son. She took them all down and put them in the loft.

@clarebear111

but you’re missing the fact that both adult children have partners that are also living there. 2 sets of savings for the deposit and 2 salaries for the mortgage. And even if they don’t want to buy with their partner it doesn’t mean they wouldn’t share the bills ( they could consider renting a room to their sibling #winwin)

There’s also nothing to say they’re in London other than it suits your argument. It might be London or the SE but it also might be anywhere else in the country. Some places are still affordable. It may well be that they don’t want to give up the fripperies to pay for it.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jul/22/is-housing-crisis-killing-romance-modern-dating-jane-austen

'It’s pressing fast forward on the relationship itself: a 2022 SpareRoom survey found that nearly a quarter of respondents would consider moving in with a partner earlier than planned to save money. It’s trapping an estimated one in 10 people in relationships they aren’t happy in because they can’t afford to move out. And it hangs around even after the breakup, forcing some exes to live together for years on end.
In an even more dystopian twist, economist Peter Kenway has predicted that, as more than three-quarters of the UK’s privately held housing wealth now sits with the over-50s, we could soon see a “Jane Austen-style marriage market, as millennials without an inheritance try to partner up with millennials who stand to inherit a house”. Far-fetched? Perhaps. But then again, house prices relative to earnings haven’t been this high since the 19th century. And now, as then, it’s a truth universally acknowledged that there is a second path to inherited wealth: your choice of partner.'

It wasn't a consideration when I married DH but DH is a third generation Londoner(albeit one who grew up on free school meals) which in some ways makes him more privileged than a middle class child from the likes of Cornwall unless the middle class child's parents can afford to buy the child a flat in London. It is why for the foreseeable future, the only FTB buying property in London and the SE would be the children of second and third generation Londoners (from cultures where living with parents is typical), people on six figures or people from families who can give six figure deposits. The children of middle class families (but who own property in the regions rather than SE) would likely move back to the north (which is cheaper) or their hometowns to buy property, likely with modest cash gifts from mum and dad. God knows what would happen to young people from poor families (who have no upward mobility), where are they expected to live once their cities and towns are gentrified.

Fully agree.

I think a lot will depend on how much the children and their partners are earning, as well as where their jobs are located and the nature of their employment (e.g. can they wfh regularly). Most of the highly paid jobs seem to be concentrated in London and the South East, or in areas where property is more expensive (e.g. Cambridge). You might expect there to be fewer job opportunities or poorer transport connections in more affordable areas.

All that aside, it seems undeniable to me that it is now much more difficult for young people to get on the housing ladder (based on average income/property price), and the world they are coming into is not one that generations before them would recognise. People are getting onto the property ladder later and will be paying off far more expensive mortgages for far longer.

I'm not saying OP shouldn't ask her children and their partners to leave if she wants to. It's her house. But I am saying I absolutely do not envy young people the world they have inherited. I think older generations (who of course worked very hard, but entered a world with relatively affordable property, final salary pensions, a secure job market, free university education and a health care system not falling apart at the seams) might want to reflect on how different the circumstances young people are facing are.

Fascinating article. And I completely agree about the impact on social mobility. It's so sad to think that what may matter the most in the future is whether or not your parents owned a home. I hope something happens to change that, but short of an industrial scale social house building programme, I can't see what is going to fix this mess.

Well more fool you for allowing it. Chuck the girlfriends out, and start charging them a realistic amount of rent for a start.

You don't actually have to allow this. You can just tell them their deadline for moving into their own place, and tell them GFs are only allowed say once a week as you aren't a hotel, and if they don't like it they can get their own place.

You aren't obligated to do this.