My parents are still living in the semi-detached bungalow on the south side of Glasgow they bought in 1971.
Up until 6 years ago was living in a detached Edwardian 4 bed house in Fleet, Hampshire and now living in a 2-bed house in Tobermory.
The financial value of your home is only part of the true value IMO.
I'm planning on staying in our house for a decade or so, but look to move to somewhere with more 'natural and community" value to retire.
My parents are still living in the semi-detached bungalow on the south side of Glasgow they bought in 1971.
Up until 6 years ago was living in a detached Edwardian 4 bed house in Fleet, Hampshire and now living in a 2-bed house in Tobermory.
The financial value of your home is only part of the true value IMO.
I'm planning on staying in our house for a decade or so, but look to move to somewhere with more 'natural and community" value to retire.
Probably on a par with my parents house however the key difference is my parents bought their house in 1989 for about 2x my dad's salary whereas I bought mine in 2020 for 5x my salary, and from memory by 1995 my dad was earning what I'm earning now in 2026, and when you adjust that for inflation he was earning significantly more. Their mortgage was also paid off way before the end of the planned 25 years
Grew up in a spacious three bed bungalow with large front and rear gardens, good sized garage with workshop/utility space and a driveway with an extra parking space (/turning circle). Views of the coast and distant hills/mountains.
Current house is an end terrace with the sort of on-street parking that can turn into convert warfare waged against your neighbours and visitors to the local community centre.
Value wise, the current house wins by a chunk as it's on the West side of Sheffield, rather than an ex-mining village in Non-Lake District Cumbria.
I have used this example before but:
I bought my flat in 1992. 2.5 x salary. Its now worth 9x the current salary for the same job. I have improved it and the area has gentrified but even so it shows how property inflation has outstripped earnings. There is nothing that I could buy in Edinburgh now for 2.5 times a band 6 nurses salary
I had to leave the country to leapfrog them. Grew up in a 4 bed detached (Barratt house on one of the biggest estates in Europe at the time). Absolutely awful place to live, no facilities worth speaking of, no shops, crap schools, lots of hidden abuse in families (that i didn't find out about until my 20's!).
Come the point i left the country, my ex and i had an inflation adjusted combined salary about 20% more than my parents ever earned when they were married, probably more than they *ever* earned. Period.
Houses we were looking at locally were either 7-8 times combined salary and really only needed decorating, or 5-6 times and needed completely gutting. They were houses to bring a family up in (3-4 bed semi or detached, mostly in village/outskirts of town).
Place we ended up with is massive, 4/5 bed. Own grounds, no real neighbours (none we could hear anyway!). Cost us about 2x take home.
Yes.
Yes again, just to meet the minimum character limit for a post.
Ignore.
Grew up In pub now live in 3 bed semi…. So probably not in most people’s eyes!
Had forgotten, but thanks to this thread... No idea why, but when I was about 5 or 6 my mom moved the three of us into my uncles barn, near Weymouth, for a year in the late 60's, early 70's. It was literally a barn on his derelict farm. No facilities at all inside. Us kids had a great time of it. Oddly enough I never met my uncle, and, as he died 30 years ago, never will. The school was odd. Just one room for all years, and a pervy doctor who made us run around naked for medical checks.
Yes.
Yes again, just to meet the minimum character limit for a post.
Well said sir.
Yes we do, but we earn more than either sets of our parents did. Obviously we suffer from the same experience as others in our age group - houses at any price point are relatively more expensive than they were 30+ years ago.
Physically bigger? Yes.
But “nicer” I don’t necessarily think so, our location probably isn’t as desirable, current market value is about the same but I don’t think that matters so much.
I’d say we have a home and living standards about on par with my parents when they were a similar age, but I reckon I am probably more stressed and we have proportionately less accumulated savings/safety net than they did, mostly because my missus jacked her old highly stressed job in for a less challenging role about 3 months ago.
Basically housing is just one aspect of “quality of life” and not necessarily the best measure. Income, security, free time, health, social groups, pastimes, community, etc are all important and having a bigger house than my parents doesn’t affect most of those TBH.
I have used this example before but:
I bought my flat in 1992. 2.5 x salary. Its now worth 9x the current salary for the same job. I have improved it and the area has gentrified but even so it shows how property inflation has outstripped earnings. There is nothing that I could buy in Edinburgh now for 2.5 times a band 6 nurses salary
there’s no doubt that property price to salary disparity has grown hugely since 1992 but a band 6 (especially a top end one) could just about manage to find something depending on your search radius and quality criteria:
Some of those areas might not be up to Leith’s standards today but perhaps not so different before you moved in and gentrified the area? (I attribute all of the enhancement simply to your presence 🙂 )
Edinburgh of course is a bit of an extreme example. If you make your search criteria within 20 miles of the city limits suddenly there’s much more property with asking prices 2.5x a lower band 6. And there are nursing jobs within cycling distance!
And I think this 1 bed flat is not far from where you grew up https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/87655500?utm_campaign=property-details&utm_content=buying&utm_medium=sharing&utm_source=copytoclipboard#/&channel=RES_BUY (if my memory is right).
So yes there’s a property price isssue - but there is property around that’s actually not as crazy priced as we might thing - but is it that we also think, well if I was earning £40k+ I didn’t think I’d have to live there?
that muirhouse one is not mortgagable and is the only property under 100 000 in Edinburgh on espc.
the dranton a d westerhailes ones are too expensive off a band 6 salary atmore than 3 x
you can only shit in one loo.
But it’s awkward when there’s someone else in the same room brushing their teeth and another in the shower at the same time.
that muirhouse one is not mortgagable and is the only property under 100 000 in Edinburgh on espc.
the dranton a d westerhailes ones are too expensive off a band 6 salary atmore than 3 x
I’ve not studied all the details of those properties they were a quick rightmove copy and paste. Obviously there may be reasons why any of them are “cheap”. Band 6 is £41,608 - 50,702 depending on experience from this year. So 2.5x = £104-£127k I did acknowledge that for 2.5x you would need to be a top band 6. Of course mortgage criteria have relaxed over time (and durations have often shifted) which is not the same thing - but the absolute number is probably not quite as important as the monthly payment. BOE rates are about half what they were in 92 - and 30 yr mortgages common so may not be as extreme an impact.
I’ll say again, I’m not denying there’s a problem and Edinburgh may be particularly bad (for Scotland) and perhaps public sector workers deserve “London Weighting” type allowances there - but a lot of those jobs: healthcare, social care, teaching, etc are available in other parts of the country where you get more for your money. Some of the really cheap areas are shitholes - but is that because of whatever the opposite is of gentrification? If nobody with Band 6 nurse type salaries wants to live there it becomes a sink for the poorest and the social challenges that go with that. To be honest Leith wasn’t far off that in 92 - it was a brave purchase.
I live in a nicer house than the one I grew up in. My house is a perfectly nice 3 bed semi in an OK area with a nice garden and we're pretty happy here, but the house I grew up in set the bar low.
I think that my current place is about as good as the semi detached (£45000, 1992) that my parents bought at 21 with 1 blue collar shift work salary and 1 kid. My dad was a school dropout, mum finished with whatever is equivalent to an A level at that time but didn't work until I was in high school.
We bought our place (495000, 2025) when I was 37, with two manager salaries and two kids. We've got masters and a PhD. It's tough but I'm really grateful for what we have. We were very lucky.
At the time of my parents first purchase, they were driving a Porsche and had a small boat. They swapped that in for various land rovers, a range rovers, etc. They also bought a holiday house in France when you could get a barn for 8000€. I have an Aygo, no boat and no 2nd home 😀
They since flipped houses in Whitby, then Goathland, then Whitby before retiring at 50 to France and renting out their house in Whitby. Each of those houses are completely unattainable for me; no way could I afford that area. I think the first one in Whitby is worth £500000 now; god knows who could afford that in the Whitby area.
Many if not most social care workers are struggling to pay rent never mind buy a house
No. Mum is still in the large 4 bed family home that was bought in 1970. As children we played in the many acres of dairy farm opposite, which has all gone now.
Hubby Yes, his dad is still in the 1969 3 bed semi.
We're in a 3 bed 1950's semi that we bought as a doer upper. Its had a double storey extension and an attic conversion since the original owner. But it's in a really nice area, much better that mum's big open plan house and hubby's dad's semi.
Feel so lucky that we bought something in a right mess and at the right time.
So if we're going to go with my childhood home vs my current home, just about. We live in a much nicer area then where I was bought up. Where I was born is flat, boring and shit. I currently live where it's hilly and generally nicer. We have climbed the housing ladder from manky places to finally somewhere that's really quite nice. Current house is bigger and in a nicer area than childhood house.
However both parents now live in bigger (4/5 bed) detached houses. But I still think that I live in a much better area.
But I will stress that my nice house is only possible thanks to one grandparent being amazing at saving, so giving me a nice inheritance early on, to help with house stuff. I'm a horrible dirty millenial.
Much bigger and nicer house than my parents. First house was around the corner from them. 3 bed terrace and cost £19,250. Current house worth south of £600k. Not showing off its just the luck of being a boomer, buying before house prices rocketed, having free Uni education and Final salary pensions etc. We both worked reasonably hard in sometimes challenging jobs for over 40 years but people always downplay luck and attribute wealth it to hard work, I know lots of mediocre people doing OK simply by being in the right place at the right time.
Most of you are probably similar ages to my kids and we will be downsizing and gifting as much as we can to them over the next few years when they need it most. Its possible I am at the same age as many of your parents so they will be boomers also and lots of the above chimes with my current kids position. Its bloody tougher for kids now (and most of you I suspect) than I remember it being for us, although I may be a bit nostalgic.
Poly - I did a little more looking into it all. A few points. House price inflation means houses cost almost double now what they did in 92 in real ( inflation adjusted)terms
Leith was already gentrifying when I moved here and far nicer than some of those areas you looked at.
Gorgie would be a decent comparison for an ungentrified area perhaps - tenement flats there that were affordable then are now far out of reach for a band 6 nurse ( and of course I started at point 1 on the scale) but cheaper than leith
Public service wages have fallen well behind inflation
So yes - I would simply be unable to take that job in Edinburgh now as housing would be unaffordable either renting or buying
As ever, the stats are clear. House price vs disposable income:
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Poly - I did a little more looking into it all. A few points. House price inflation means houses cost almost double now what they did in 92 in real ( inflation adjusted)termsLeith was already gentrifying when I moved here and far nicer than some of those areas you looked at.
Gorgie would be a decent comparison for an ungentrified area perhaps - tenement flats there that were affordable then are now far out of reach for a band 6 nurse ( and of course I started at point 1 on the scale) but cheaper than leith
Public service wages have fallen well behind inflation
Not really disputing any of that but:
And yet presumably NHS manages to still hire Band 6 nurses? Because:So yes - I would simply be unable to take that job in Edinburgh now as housing would be unaffordable either renting or buying
- people often aren't buying their first house alone; there may be an issue that this suits normalised relationship stereotypes and may even lead people to bad decisions - but its much easier for a couple of friends to buy together, or to have spare room rental income included in affordability models than it was in 1992.
- (grand)parents, government help to buy and other incentives which weren't around in 1992 might just tip the balance
- you can now borrow much more than 3x salary, probably on a longer term mortgage
- people live further out - your money gets you a lot more even <20 miles outside the city
- people take other jobs in lower cost areas! A Band 6 Nurse working in Dumfries, Kircaldy, or many of the other smaller hospitals would be comparatively "rich" compared to their classmates drawn to the bright lights.
So IF you say 4.5x salary, with a "sensible" deposit - your first point of Band 6 Nurse, could potentially "afford" something up to £150K purchase price. Rightmove says there are >100 properties that meet that criteria in the City of Edinburgh (and you can tripple that by adding a 10 mile radius on the city limits).
Ultimately if Edinburgh's public services struggle more than others they'd need to pay more or services would drop which might make Edinburgh less attractive to live in, reducing house prices and correcting the issue! To some extent this problem is generated by the country-wide fixed salary bands negotiated with Unions. Really if its hard to hire staff in a locality you should be able to pay more (and if cost of living in an area is less you might be able to pay less!).
MOAB's graph shows you bought at just the right time.
I grew up in a fairly rural area and now by choice live in an (expensive) city which skews things a bit in terms of comparing by size and land but overall, no, no chance I could afford any of the houses I was brought up in at today's prices.
Most of you are probably similar ages to my kids and we will be downsizing and gifting as much as we can to them over the next few years when they need it most.
Obviously I don't know the exact age and circumstances of your kids but if they are older than mid thirties I'd say on average you've missed the point when they need it most.
The decent house we are in now has come much later in life than than when we really needed it. We spent years in a too small house with inadequate outdoor space when our children were small and we all would have really benefitted from more space.
No. My parents were both teachers. We always had a decent sized 4 bedroomed house growing up, the one I spent most of my years in got extended with a nice big kitchen and a study. Many of the teachers my wife works with, despite living in the economically disadvantaged South Wales Valleys, can't afford to buy houses at all and they rent.
Has this turned into another TJ 'look at how frugal and therefore worthy I am' thread?
NOpe - I am just pointing out that housing has become unaffordable in many places / cities for public servants and how much house prices have outstripped inflation and pay as you also point out.
I personally have done very well out of this
Nope!
No, my parents' house is much much nicer than what I am renting now. I also doubt I can afford a house like that nowadays if I stayed.
They have a good life earning a living in a laidback country, while I couldn't get a job there to sustain myself (very low salary) and had to travel half the world just to earn something. Well, if I stayed I might still be trying to pay off my £5k 668cc mini car.
They also bought a holiday house in France when you could get a barn for 8000€. I have an Aygo, no boat and no 2nd home 😀
You can still buy an €8k barn in France. Still buy €30k small cottages etc.
House and garden - No. Area - Yes.
Borrowing over the last 30yrs has been pretty cheap, but that's offset by the increase in house prices driven by aspiration and the rental market hoovering up capacity.
The other factor that's overlooked I think is the sheer scale of normalised additional spending each month many of us do compared to our parents - 2 cars or more, mobile phones, broadband, eating out, couple of foreign holidays a year etc etc. My parents lived very modestly until they were well into retirement, with good pensions and investments to fund a very nice lifestyle at that point, having paid off what proportional to their income was probably a big mortgage.
Obviously I don't know the exact age and circumstances of your kids but if they are older than mid thirties I'd say on average you've missed the point when they need it most.
The decent house we are in now has come much later in life than than when we really needed it. We spent years in a too small house with inadequate outdoor space when our children were small and we all would have really benefitted from more space.
Indeed I was reading an article a year or so back that the biggest win in inherited wealth is no the huge lump sum later in life when a parent dies or downsizes. The real win is things that are done when kid is in late teens or 20s. Things like house deposit contribution, the hand-me-down car so kid never buys their own car, kid not borrowing so much on student loan as they are given £1k a month to live on, the paid for holidays, the £200 in cash every time you visit, the 'pay for a new kitchen in my house' and so many creative ways that transfer wealth earlier and in a constant manner.
We are living in an age where inherited wealth is a bigger defining factor than earned wealth. By a huge margin.
We are living in an age where inherited wealth is a bigger defining factor than earned wealth. By a huge margin.
Has it not always been so? That’s the reason the aristocracy continue to be “successful” - they start off in wealthy families. Those at the bottom of the ladder face the steepest climb, and it has almost always been so. At the risk of appearing to applaud Mrs Thatcher, right to buy was a move that let people pull themselves up. Unfortunately if also broke the funds so anyone left behind would find it even harder. It’s a policy that had some logic, and was political genius - I can show you people today who still align themselves more towards the Tories because that policy allowed them to achieve social mobility. They often tell themselves it’s because their hard work got them where they are - just as many of those with inherited wealth is more that luck.
To bring us vaguely back on track with the topic: if the answer is no - does it mean your parents are sitting on a stack of assets they don’t need whilst watching their children struggle to climb up? I’m not saying people should give away their wealth but I do shake my head when I hear people going to great lengths to do inheritance tax planning - what on earth are they planning to do in the final years of their lives with all that wealth?
To bring us vaguely back on track with the topic: if the answer is no - does it mean your parents are sitting on a stack of assets they don’t need whilst watching their children struggle to climb up?
Yup, when I was trying to get on the housing ladder and had a baby my parents had paid off their mortgages. They were both able to buy a holiday home in another country. Didn't even cross their minds to help me and my sister even though their parents had massively subsidised their own first house purchase.
Has it not always been so?
I understand that the change is increasing - not just the super wealthy, but the middle earners/wealth folk as well.
https://www.kctrust.co.uk/passing-on-the-pounds
Indeed I was reading an article a year or so back that the biggest win in inherited wealth is no the huge lump sum later in life when a parent dies or downsizes. The real win is things that are done when kid is in late teens or 20s. Things like house deposit contribution, the hand-me-down car so kid never buys their own car, kid not borrowing so much on student loan as they are given £1k a month to live on, the paid for holidays, the £200 in cash every time you visit, the 'pay for a new kitchen in my house' and so many creative ways that transfer wealth earlier and in a constant manner.
We are living in an age where inherited wealth is a bigger defining factor than earned wealth. By a huge margin.
My kids are 30 and 28. Im 61 and retired. We helped both with their deposits (my retirement for the last few months has been refurbishing my eldests house to allow her to move in....) totally agree and that has been our intention, provide them with cash and help now (we are very lucky to be in a position to do it) as well as downsizing in a few years time and giving them cash then. Hopefully they can have the smaller house as well when we die but experience tells me this seldom works out.
You are about as young as a boomer can be then and seriously underestimating the age of people on here I think😀
About the same as my parents (I'm late 40s) but not my partner's parents. But, we don't have (three) kids and my mum only worked part time.
I guess what you're getting at, are we as well placed financially as my parents. The answer to that is LOL no.
Those at the bottom of the ladder face the steepest climb
Being able to afford paying off our mortgage early saved us, bit fuzzy on this number so don't hold me to it, £18k.
That's £18k that if we had less money we'd have had to pay.
I guess what you're getting at, are we as well placed financially as my parents.No this thread was triggered by a comment i made in the cost of living crisis thread, which was essentially "our standards of living / expectations have grown too" one of the ways I saw that was that if I lived I was living in the house I grew up in I would be rolling in cash. It was a bit of a blinkered view because obviously some who had a luckier start have struggled to maintain the status quo.
(To put some perspective on this my own children have never scraped the ice ("Jack Frost") off the inside of the windows in our house).
Interestingly, the disposable income line has gotten steeper since COVID, implying disposable income is growing faster than it was? Or is that just because it's relative to 1970 so will always grow exponentially even if the year on year percentages are more consistent?
Certainly hasn't felt like it!
Certainly hasn't felt like it!
Maybe, I do wonder what the prevalence of consumerism and inequality has on experience and perceptions. Is there an equivalent chart for varying income brackets?
WTF is that house price against disposable income meant to represent? It doesn't make sense as a comparison and very much feels like a "statistic" that doesn't tell a true story, just 2 unrelated lines that are on a similar trajectory put on a single chart to misrepresent the current impacts of financial inequality. A lot of people now have much less "disposable income" because a few have a hoarded a huge amount, even if the whole pot has got bigger it isn't even close to being evenly distributed.
I grew up in a 4 bed semi which is smaller than my current house and worth about half as much. My dad still lives there. It's a nice house, but I guess my current house is objectively nicer - that said, my parents house had much better mountain biking (Farnborough vs a Village near Newbury (clay boo)).
I got an AI to do an analysis of all the responses (excluding mine):
No (26/84, 31%) - Parents' house was nicer (inc. where parents later downsized)
No, by choice (4/84, 5%) - Parents' house was nicer but respondent chose to live smaller/cheaper
Mixed (17/84, 20%) - Nicer in some ways, worse in others (e.g. worth more but smaller, or bigger but worse area)
Similar (9/84, 11%) - Roughly equivalent to parents' house
Interesting question!
WTF is that house price against disposable income meant to represent? It doesn't make sense as a comparison and very much feels like a "statistic" that doesn't tell a true story, just 2 unrelated lines that are on a similar trajectory put on a single chart to misrepresent the current impacts of financial inequality. A lot of people now have much less "disposable income" because a few have a hoarded a huge amount, even if the whole pot has got bigger it isn't even close to being evenly distributed.
well the first thing to understand is what the ONS means by disposable income: it’s income after all tax (including Council tax) is deducted. To me that is not what many people mean by disposable income - my expectation would be that “property” costs were deducted which would of course make a very different line.
the other thing with any average is it never tells you the whole picture, but that is true of property as well as earnings - in fact with minimum wage pushing based incomes up and property developers tending to chase the higher value sales those shift in the distribution would be particularly interesting.