Anyone downsized after the kids left home?

[Mumwithbaggage]

We have 4 children - only the youngest (22) is still at home (some of the time). I love having a big house for when they all turn up with partners but really, we no longer need 5 beds, 3 baths, 3 reception rooms and a large garden for 50 weeks of the year.

If you have downsized, where do your kids all stay when they come to visit?

@Maidenjourney but you’d be moving to a more expensive area and using all your savings just for Christmas really? Sort of? I wouldn’t do that IIWY (but I'm not you, obvs!). Maybe the way your parents behaved has affected how you feel about this issue, understandably.

My parents had a large family home but hated having people there which seemed pointless so when we first had a big enough house I hosted loads of my family, left right and centre, I suppose as a reaction to it. 20+ for lunch, Christmas x 15 etc. I’ve stopped now as it’s expensive, hard work and not always that rewarding!

Well.. we’d be moving so we are closer and it’s easier to see them , particularly for shorter periods. We don’t want a huge house, just somewhere with a garden, not too close to neighbours and at least two spare bedrooms.

That's not relevant though? Of course there are some people still driving in their 90s, just like there are some chain smokers who are still well at 90. Most are not. Do you think it is wise to make plans assuming that you will be one of the small percentage of couples who are alive and fully capable all the way into their 90s or is it more sensible to have some kind of back up plan, especially one which takes your DC into account?

We moved to the classic 2 bed bungalow 10 minutes away from the beach. Lived in Surrey,3 bed 1930s cottage. Wanted to be near beach, countryside to walk with the dogs. Moved just 50 miles to east Sussex, bought for cash (needed work)I was 60,DH 7 years younger. He was happy with 80 mile round trip commute. A few months after moving in, his company liquidated, I had given my notice the week before, got a job in a local hospital. He had a breakdown, I rescinded my notice, stayed put. London weighting and high cost living allowance plus night rate. I had a 100 mile round trip commute, I did that for 5 years,DH is 7 years younger. occasionally stayed with youngest DD. She has now moved 10 minutes up the road. Most weeks I have a dgk staying..we wanted a much bigger garden. Edge of a village,there's buses, station 2 miles away, and we're detached and unoverlooked.

I can't really relate to downsizing as I live with my two young adults in a two bed, and I sleep in the living room. I'm rather looking forward to getting a bedroom one day!

So I won't be downsizing, but am certainly considering moving somewhere cheaper (ie out of London) when I retire in the next few years. It's hard to pick the perfect spot, though. I've witnessed my in-laws staying too long in their country home, over-reliant on immediate neighbours snd very isolated once they could no longer drive. I want to continue my Londoner privilege of being able to access facilities without needing a car.

I've slso seen my db and SIL actually upsize after their kids left home, moving to a bigger house near the coast with rooms for their children snd grandchildren to stay. But the children rsrely come, busy with their own lives and not keen on the long journey to this remote location. And the grandchildren haven't materialised and perhaps never will.

It's tricky to predict what we will need in ten or twenty years, isn't it?

Why live your life around a pub? How often are you in the pub? Why live your life around a shop when Waitrose deliver? Or heating and maintaining a huge house in case the kids stay - there are plenty of b&bs ! Live your life where you want to spend 99.99% of your time in retirement and what makes you happy in your dotage - you only live once.

We haven't yet, but plan to at the end of this year. We are only in a 3 bed terrace, 2 kids have moved out, 2 will this year. We are late 40s, so plan to move to a 2 bed doer upper. The hope is it will become our job, doing up houses. Husband is a joiner and I'm pretty good at design. It's an obvious choice for us. If we don't like it we are still young enough to get jobs.
We've always lived in houses that are 'size appropriate', never massive houses. Partially to do woth finances, but mainly because I don't see the point in having loads of spare house. I'd rather have the financial freedom.
So, once our house sells, we travel.

This is a fascinating thread, and something I’ve thought on a lot, my parents are in the family home and their only move now will be a nursing home. It’s a total shitshow.

When do you time it right? I know the OP was asking about downsizing after kids leave, but the replies where people give reasons not to downsize straight away are really interesting.

At the moment I’m swaying towards just doing one more move - to a two bed flat near amenities, probably in a managed block, I’ve earmarked a few already, though it’s hopefully 20 plus years away.

But I intend to declutter on a regular basis (we do this to some extent already) and make the current house more generally accessible in the meantime. I suspect my youngest DC may need a home with us until to mid late 20s anyway.

One negative would be not being able to free up cash for housing deposit gifts. But the cost of moving is high so reducing to just one further move might negate that overall, just timing issues.

Any ill health would obviously change these plans.

Staying where you are until you can't manage the house and garden anymore sounds reasonable at first glance.
BUT if you don't feel up to managing the house & garden is it not likely that you also won't feel up to coping with the upheaval of moving.
Is that not the crux of the problem? For downsizing to happen at all it has to be done before you want to do it.

We downsized 12 months ago - no issues for us as we only have 2 DC and 3 beds plus office/bedroom from the 5 bed we moved from - so still plenty of space!

From the opposite perspective, my mum has 4 kids and was considering downsizing a few years ago. She didn't, luckily and now we always all go there for Christmas/easter/birthdays etc and it's brilliant. All 4 kids has 2 children so 8 grandchildren and they have the time of their lives at nanny's house. If she had downsized ive not idea what we would do.

When we moved out we thought it nice to return the favour of parents always hosting and we invited them to us on rotation.

Thats a cool story, thanks.
We could do that, but my mum loves to host so wouldn't want that. She also wouldn't want to travel the 3+ hrs it takes to get to 2 of the kids houses.

Cool story?? 🙄

This is a great thread. We downsized four years ago when we sold our business and retired. it was always our long term plan to be near our adult children and be near London, the seaside and airports for travel etc.

We moved from the midlands to the south between London and Brighton. It’s absolutely fantastic. We had a very large five bedroom house with a large quarter acre garden and now have a new three bed new house in a village.

It’s so modern and easy to care for! The location we are in is amazing, the only problem as we get even older is if we can no longer drive, in which case we’d have to move again to a town where we could get taxis more easily. Although I’d prefer not to, I wouldn’t hesitate for quality of life as we age.

Our current house has a big advantage of enough space to still be able to have our family to stay (which is important to us). It’s also great as I’ve got a lovely garden which I’ve been developing with extended borders and lovely planting. I have a gardener who does all the heavy work and maintenance and I can just do the bits I want to do.

We moved during lockdown/covid which provided its own challenges! The hardest thing was getting rid of most of our furniture (moving from an old to a new house) and a load of clutter/stuff! Moving area is not for the faint hearted either!

Everyone is different, but even if we’d not moved areas we’d have downsized. Living in and maintaining a big house is no fun as you get older. It stops you living life as it was intended and being able to get out and have fun!

I think the big difference is your downsizing can still accommodate the family. For A lot of posters on here that wouldn't be the case

After caring for elderly patients for 30 years I found so many couples retired to a cottage by the sea only to find after a few years one partner passes then remaining falls and can’t use stairs which are often unsuitable for stair lift - bathroom upstairs etc. I used to say it should be the law that everyone over 70 should have a bungalow because you do not know what’s around the corner!

Good luck finding enough bungalows to go round - they're like hen's teeth!

Agree
and good luck also imposing a law on choice of home !!

We moved over 20 years ago. Same size as our house but a bungalow in a village. Great at the time but only a convenience shop and hairdresser, car/bus ride to supermarket. Moved then to another bungalow in small town/village with buses. The buses were mostly withdrawn. We are now in a house (4 beds 2 baths). Walking distance to supermarkets (5 mins either way) plus library other shops, pubs with and without food, cafes, doctors, lots of buses to city, large towns and view to countryside: Perfection in older age. Icing on cake: Lovely neighbours all round, but not nosy.

Yes they have reduced their price, twice, but still no viewings - the market is currently dead around here for 4/5 bedroom houses unless they are brand new, and there are lots of new ones in the 4 bedroom size.They are not going to undersell.

We live reasonably close to three of our four children now, so no problem with bedrooms. But actually even after our first downsize (when we had a house and not our current flat) it was very rare for them all to come at once.

Yes. Downsized late fifties when DS was 18. Went to a small 3 bed terraced house in centre of town from the suburbs. Still room for 2 grown up children to come and stay, DD & partner lived here for 6 months between houses. No gardening responsibilities, just a cute small walled garden, don’t need a second car, cleaning the house is quicker, heating bills cheaper and we walk everywhere and rare occasions we need more space we have put family up in a nearby BnB. It was a total shot in the arm and would do it again in an instant.

Not downsize but seriously considering selling our great London home and ‘escape to the country’. DD is in the Royal Navy and definitely won’t be living this way.
We could buy something similar a lot cheaper and retire comfortably, maybe a bit for DD.

My parents had a huge house with a room for each of us. a pool etc. they downsized, no space in bedrooms as didn’t declutter enough, no pool, tiny garden, we try to go, but see them much less and rarely have family gatherings there. They had to downsize, garden was way too big, heating bills were vast, it needed renovations but we see them less. Some reduction was natural, it’s easier to get young cousins together than older ones with more activities in their lives, but you get the idea.