Demographic timebomb and housing

[Salisburyspire]

When do we think babyboomers will begin to sell? This is not a generational bashing thread by the way, am asking from a strategic point of view.

Any economists or demographers out there? I have only seen one UK article on this and it predicted they wouldn’t sell until 2034 onwards. Surely that’s too late? Is there a particular five year period during which we expect there to be a huge downsizing?

When they do sell up, will it leave a glut of large homes on the market? I’m Gen X but very much want to trade up (one last large house). We own our house outright but the next step up in the area near DC schools has exponentially shot up over the last three years. (Leafy London but not too far out). One issue is a massive shortage of decent housing stock in that area. Our plan was always to move there, see the DC through school and then downsize as there doesn’t seem any point to living in a big house without the kids there when we could by then be enjoying a more comfortable retirement and liberating some property cash while not worrying as much about inheritance tax or costs of maintaining a large house and garden.

It seems though that the generation before is not budging. There are widowed people living in enormous five bedrooms homes with huge gardens. They don’t all look to be super wealthy judging by some of the slightly overgrown gardens etc. Yes it’s a wealthy area and yes it’s their right to live wherever they want. However unless all these homes are in a family trust or already signed over, the inheritance tax bill will be enormous.
These are homes in the £2million plus bracket.

If we are lucky enough to buy one of these homes (and stretch ourselves massively) do the demographics work against us if we have to sell in 10-15 years? Won’t that coincide with a glut of large houses so we will have bought at the top of the market and possibly be selling in a downturn?

Will Generation X actually be the riskiest generation to lend to as they don’t have enough working years ahead of them to properly pay down massive mortgages whilst some (not all!!) millennials will inherit property wealth from babyboomer parents?

Should the government reform stamp duty to provide an incentive to downsize? (Yes I know there are not enough quality smaller homes for people used to huge ones in nice areas). Will there ever be a great downsizing shift or is our country not built for it?

I agree entirely with what @GrendelsGrandma says here:

'Nothing will change until the numbers reduce enough that boomers are less of an electoral force. For now, everything is geared towards them.'

It reminds me of this article by Polly Toynbee earlier this week:
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/18/pensioner-poverty-tory-crisis-wealth-rich-pensioners#comment-155494963

and also what she (or he) says here:
'@thatsgoingtohurt I just don't buy this - all generations have some people who work hard and some who don't (not always through their own fault)
Why would they move? Because families with children are squeezing into tiny houses and they have a social conscience?'

Also what @Stevie77 says in the 9.10 post about fluidity and under occupancy directly leading to adult children/ grandchildren not being able to buy.

Unfortunately, we then have the response from @TizerorFizz who seems to not understand the points being made and makes a Kirstie Allsopp like suggestion that families should squeeze in or move to cheaper areas (which obviously they are being forced to do already). Do you need see the social consequences at all? Surely it's not hard to understand the resentment and discontentment from younger generations when their hard work doesn't result in a secure salary, home, pension, etc like it did for their parents. In terms of the wider society it isn't sensible to have a single person or couple in a large house with multiple bedrooms because they like it (a wish) when the family with several children can only afford a 2 bedroom (but may need 3 or 4 to accommodate their family). Work simply doesn't pay anymore and, sadly, as a country, we have become much more selfish. I find that sad.

'I hate to say it, but larger families just have to squeeze in if they cannot move. Number of children is a choice. Or move to another cheaper area where there is choice. They don’t want to do this but think others should. I don’t buy this either.

I tend to think all generations work, some harder than others.'

Other poster have made the very valid point that there is a lack of suitable housing for older people who do wish to downsize. In my experience, generally, it tends to be older people who are the most vocal when it comes to objections to new developments.

I also agree with the OP's earlier comments about beautiful, large houses falling apart because the owners cannot afford the necessary repairs or do not notice the need due to declining physical or mental abilities. It's such a shame that these houses are being allowed to deteriorate so much by their owners.

I definitely agree with you there @TizerorFizz I've only seen one house builder out of the bazillion we recently looked at (for ourselves) that had considered the needs of people who might have accessibility needs - wider doorways, downstairs walk in showers, extra downstairs spaces, and obvious multi generational living set up.

Older people shouldn't feel forced out of their home for any reason. It's such a shame to see people so isolated because they physically can't get out of their houses, or asking me about permanent care because their home scares them. That there are so many people looking to buy bigger houses too and seeing older people as hogging them is an additional issue, though I totally see it.

@rainingsnoring I said it to the op and I'll say it to you, what has it got to do with you that some houses aren't maintained to a standard you deem acceptable? In fact, how many houses are there like that anyway? I live rurally and, apart from some long derelict cottages, all the big houses look fine - it is often smaller properties owned by people with little spare income that can look a bit ropey tbh. Of all the things in this world to say 'isn't it a shame' about, the state (or not) of privately owned housing stock is one thing that would not be the first, or even fiftieth, to come to my mind.

@TizerorFizz I grew up in a similar house - large family house next door to a 'granny' annexe/bunngalow. It did come with problems though - money for the annexe came from sale of her house. It would have been impossible to sell the annexe separately to fund care in a nursing home. It didn't get to that stage as she died before that, but she was getting to the stage of needing personal care and then comes the question of who does that?

Even if it doesn't come down to providing care, it can be quite a lonely existence if the kids are at school every day and the parents at work. It's not like the parents are popping in and out all the time.

If you don't get on with your elderly relative I can imagine it would get really awful having them there the whole time. There is no way I could do this with my mum - it's bad enough having her to stay for a few nights at Christmas.

How do you decide which granny lives in it? Easy for us as there was only one grandparent alive but I can imagine families with four grandparents all still alive but divorced so four separate single households!

And once the grandparent(s) have passed on, what happens to it? Ours ended up empty when my brother and I were still early teens so the family home was still needed, just with nobody to live in the annexe but still had to pay the bills for it.

We've been trying to buy a bigger house for the last few months and it's been very noticeable that the only bigger houses coming on the market are either probate or elderly owner who can no longer manage stairs/garden. The elderly owners aren't baby boomers though, but the generation above them, so 80s and 90s. And from the state of the houses (work needed to roofs, rewiring, windows need replacing, leaky guttering, signs of damp, jungle gardens) they stopped actively maintaining their houses probably 15-20 years earlier, which would fit with doing work on the house as an active retired person of maybe late 60s and 70s, then struggling and running out of umph after that.

@Stevie77

I’ve not read the whole thread, but I think people are missing the point. Under occupancy, which a single person/couple living in a 4-5 bedroom house is, has far reaching impact on mobility within the housing infrastructure. All these 2-3 bedroom houses that people said they can’t find to downsize to - it’s because they’re occupied by those who need more space but can’t move up the ladder. And that also leads to a lack of smaller properties for FTB.

Someone up-thread mentioned their adult children struggle to afford to find and buy starter homes - well, can you really not see the link? If there’s minimal movement, up and down the ladder, it impacts everyone.

What you are not getting is once you have reached a certain standard of housing, large, detached, in its own plot like I have, then there is no way on planet earth that I want to move downmarket to a terrace or semi, downsizing and moving downmarket are very different things, if there were an abundance of detached houses with large living spaces and fewer bedrooms, with garages and gardens more people would be inclined to move, no way once I reach retirement age do I want to have to contend with looking and hearing screaming kids on trampolines and tv’s through walls.

Unfortunately, we then have the response from @TizerorFizz who seems to not understand the points being made and makes a Kirstie Allsopp like suggestion that families should squeeze in or move to cheaper areas (which obviously they are being forced to do already). Do you need see the social consequences at all? Surely it's not hard to understand the resentment and discontentment from younger generations when their hard work doesn't result in a secure salary, home, pension, etc like it did for their parents. In terms of the wider society it isn't sensible to have a single person or couple in a large house with multiple bedrooms because they like it (a wish) when the family with several children can only afford a 2 bedroom (but may need 3 or 4 to accommodate their family). Work simply doesn't pay anymore and, sadly, as a country, we have become much more selfish. I find that sad.

It was your choice, your “wish” to have children and you chose that whilst not being able to house them adequately, that is a problem of your own making, don’t expect others to fund your lifestyle choices. Honestly the entitlement on this thread is unbelievable, would you like my car as well? It has seats in the back which I clearly don’t need, better hand over the keys to someone far more deserving.

@AmberLynn1536 I agree with you. We are in our 60's and, shock horror, we actually extended our house a few years ago. We don't have children, but have room for other family to stay, and more importantly have the sort of house that suits us. There are two problems with moving, which we might do, if only to be near public transport. Yes, this house would be ideal for a large family, but would it be in their budget? I would have loved a large house in my 30s, but could only afford a small one. We live rurally where wages tend to be on the lower side too. Also if we move we want a house of a similar size, not a smaller one. I can think of nothing more depressing than moving back down the ladder, having to chose which furniture to get rid of, contemplating less storage, less parking etc etc. Until (if ever) the market stops being so crazy - the houses that would suit us seem to sell immediately - we won't get serious about moving.

@Brownlongearedbat
You have articulated what concerns me. I hate the thought of furniture not fitting in. I love my furniture! All sorts of things needing to be changed in a new home. I’ve got what I like here.

I do have a large house and lots of land. It won’t be cheap when it’s sold. In the meantime we like the storage and space. We have a separate flat above the garage so might just get residential help if we need it!

I think people have to cut their coat according to their cloth. I’m sorry if anyone finds it sad that DH’s business employed over 100 people (with decent pensions) and we have several rather large cars. However we are not living in a controlled state so I’m happy with what we have achieved and my DC will get plenty. Already have in fact.

I spent most of my childhood in a 2 bedroom house with parents and 2 siblings. No inside bathroom and no heating other than coal fires. So I’m now enjoying my house. I can heat it, its highly insulated and I do have lots of bedrooms and 5 bathrooms. I do resent being told I’m sad for not wanting to move.

I don’t think anybody saying your sad for not wanting to move but the bottom line is you are causing a bottleneck through no fault of your own it’s not your fault that the planning departments haven’t thought this one through. @TizerorFizz
The truth of it is it will be in absolutely blunt we are all living too long, this was never part of the plan.

We live in a street where most people stay till they die. We live ver close to an excellent school.
Our house (3 bed) came up after a divorce.
The 3 bed across the way came up for sale a few years ago and we hoped for a young family but instead a single woman (40ish) moved in.
Then next door 4/5 bed moved away and downsized as their last adult children moved away. Again we hoped for a family but this time it’s a couple in their 50s.
They’re all lovely people but it seems the trend here is for adults to have 2-3 bedrooms per person!

As my house is worth £££ I don’t see we are a bottleneck. I don’t see many local people being able to afford it. One house here with 6 beds was sold to a couple in their 70s. Their house was bought by HS2 so they moved to equivalent a couple of miles away. Others have moved here from London. They have bought for £3 million plus. We are a very expensive bottle neck!

Where we are there are lots of streets of 1930s semis. No-one my age (nearly 50) who bought when they were affordable in the early 2000s has been able to afford to move up to anything bigger since then as their families grew. So these 30s 3 bed semis (with one a box room) have been extended, often with loft conversions, and/or big L shaped downstairs extensions.

We've done similar. But now I wonder what will happen when our teens leave home and we get to retirement age. This will be too big for us, but there are few original semis left that have had no extensions. So then we'd be stuck with downsizing to Victorian terraces, which are often not great for older infirm people - narrow steep staircases or not very well-insulated. No garden either for those who finally have the time to garden after giving up work.

What would be ideal for retired pepole is a little 2 bed bungalow with a garden. Not too far from high street amenities. But there are hardly ANY round here, so the ones that do come up are as much as a 30s semi!!! Sometimes more if they have a lot of land (I think they are being bought by developers, with plans to knock the bungalows down and build a block of cramped flats on the land instead).

No-one wants to risk moving to a flat if you've had the luxury of your own house for many years. Been there, done that and had neighbour and noise problems and really don't look forward to a flat being my only choice as an elderly person.

So for now, our plan is to stay put. I'm aware that this means the families are crammed into small terraces with no gardens, but until housing choice is improved for independent elderly people then they're simply not going to budge.

@CurlyhairedAssassin that’s exactly my situation. Mine is one of the last few in the road to not be more than a 3 bed and had already had an extension downstairs (v small) when we got it. I can’t see myself ever having the money to move to the next logical step up, so will probably do more work if funds allow or make the most of what’s here.

@museumum

We live in a street where most people stay till they die. We live ver close to an excellent school. Our house (3 bed) came up after a divorce. The 3 bed across the way came up for sale a few years ago and we hoped for a young family but instead a single woman (40ish) moved in. Then next door 4/5 bed moved away and downsized as their last adult children moved away. Again we hoped for a family but this time it’s a couple in their 50s. They’re all lovely people but it seems the trend here is for adults to have 2-3 bedrooms per person!

Working from home? Plenty of people were doing that even before lockdown. I was. It's a lot easier to do that if you've got space.

Why is a 3 bed semi too big? Nearly everyone I know has that or bigger. 2 beds is no good for DC and grandchildren staying over. Nor friends. We frequently host friends staying at our place. I would like that to continue.

I do think developers could incorporate bungalows but land is hugely expensive so the bungalows would be. Just inevitable. I’m thinking of a “grand designs” one! I would be happy with high end design in a handy location!

Terraces with a downstairs bathroom and court yard garden close to town would be ideal in my 60’s i think. Sound proofing if need be

@WellNotReally

Thing is they can. They’ve benefitted from the best pensions - final salary etc

Wild generalisations about entire generations, such nonsense.

So many women born in the 40s and 50s all working in well paid jobs with fantastic final salary schemes. Surely you don't really believe that? Many women were forced/expected to give up work as soon as they married. And those that did returrn to work were paid way less than men in identical roles. And there were very few private pension schemes. You might also want to read up on the reduced state pension many of these women were or are entitled to, because of lack of NI contributions.

Exactly. My mum is in her seventies and all her NI contributions went to my dad who then left her. She has no pension.

I think all the boomer-bashing should stop forthwith. It's a huge generation spanning a very long period. We didn't all have final salary pensions, and many companies that had them have been taken over by newer organisations, most of which shifted to defined contribution schemes. I suspect my mum is fairly typical of the house blockers at the top age end. She's 87, bought the house 30 years ago, with help from her children: a two up two down Victorian terrace. Almost all the houses in her street are owned by BTL landlords. Her pension income is the minimum, topped up by pension credit, because that is the reality for women of her generation. Fortunately, her kids can help her out financially and practically.

@WellNotReally has nailed it. Working women in the 40s and 50s didn't have well paid jobs with final salary pensions. My DM was married to a man who had one, and the pressure put on her to accept a lump sum after divorcing in 1977, which wouldn't meet the bird food bill now, was so forceful that she eventually relented. The reality is more complicated than this, but there are lots of elderly ladies living on very tight budgets. Their saving grace is that they remember the WW2 economy tips.

Some ‘boomers’ are still under 60 and don’t have final salary pensions. Even if they had them the government stopped them 12 years ago.

The government didn’t stop companies offering them but they are unaffordable due to people living much longer. That’s why the government had to reduce their liabilities. They are not affordable. Our DC are paying for these pension that they will never have.

@XingMing there can be very few people alive now who actually remember ww2 economy tips (as opposed to passed down thriftiness). To have been a teenager or young adult in 1939 you would now be approaching, or beyond, 100 years old. The Queen would possibly know some, but then I don't expect economy was a great problem for her!

My mum is 98. She remembers everything about the war. She was a nurse in London and the hospital was bombed. Rations were very meagre. It was scrimp and make do all the time. She certainly has that attitude now.

Under-occupancy preys on my mind. I'm in a cluster of under-occupied homes, most of us are GenX. We're waiting for last DC to finish local high school (2 more years) before we move on.

My pre-Boomer parents have lived in a small 1-2 bed condo for almost 30 years. In very expensive neighbourhood, mind.

it was your choice, your “wish” to have children and you chose that whilst not being able to house them adequately, that is a problem of your own making, don’t expect others to fund your lifestyle choices.

Lots of women these days are not having children though. Apparently unaffordable housing is one of the reasons for this 'choice'.