Daily Telegraph says 1 in 4 Pensioners are millionaires

annsixty

What this does mean is that in future there will be lots more millionaires, the children of those pensioners who will inherit those properties, depending of course on how many offspring there are.
That is why I believe in inheritance tax.

There is already a good whack of inheritance tax taken off £1m.

Of course any such inheritance is always very nice, but even if there is only one child who is the heir, who lives - and plans to live - in a considerably cheaper area, the legacy is not going to make him or her a millionaire, or anything like it. Unless of course they already have their own stash tucked away.

Anywhere around here, even a nice enough 2 bed flat can easily set you back £500k plus. And this is an outer area of Greater London.

Asset rich and cash poor.
Exactly.

A sound plan there Monica.
I don't dare count how many moves we've made going up (and twice down!) the property ladder. It has been fun and lucrative, but hair raising too.

When I think about what the house is in money terms, it isn't even in terms of inheritance for our children. It is the knowledge that if we need to go into care, there will be no cost concerns, we can choose any home we fancy.
I totally agree. But maybe that's easy to say if one's own children are financially secure.

We have never made any housing decision buy/sell/where/when/ for any financial gain.

Our house is our home and, when we have moved house it has been in order to get a bigger house as our family grew, then one more suitable for work and schools, and then the home of our dreams. We succeeded in that 25 years ago, and haven't moved since.

It was bought as a 'project' and over those 25 years we have nurtured it, spent money on it and we have no desire to move.

When I think about what the house is in money terms, it isn't even in terms of inheritance for our children. It is the knowledge that if we need to go into care, there will be no cost concerns, we can choose any home we fancy.

Thirty years ago, after a surge in house prices, my parents said exactly the same thing, at least it measnt they could afford to choose and pay for any vare they might need.

As we grow older, as a nation, more of us will be in care homes and for longer. This is where much of the proceeds from £1 million houses will go.

That's interesting reading Casdon, thanks. What it implies is that, unless they were complete fools or reckless with money, most people of our generation will have reaped the benefits of our own parents' better education, jobs and improved health. Especially if they lived in desirable locations. So a knock on effect from our own pasts, which will undoubtedly continue into future generations and the divide in wealth will continue to grow.

What surprised me a bit was that wealth is lower for individuals identifying as bisexual compared with those identifying as heterosexual. I would have thought the average partnership of two males had the potential to be far more wealthy in terms of income. Surely it can no longer be that people are disinherited for their sexual leanings?

Making money on property can be down to timing too and there are games to be played.
When we lived in France lock, stock and barrel, property prices back in the UK were going bananas while those in France were stagnant. We came a bit unstuck. However, come the downturn in 2008 that JenniferEccles mentions, our game plan was to recoup our losses and cash in on the favourable exchange rate and drive a hard bargain in an ailing UK property market.
But taking risks is a different story altogether and not many older people like throwing caution to the wind.

I’m surprised that nobody has mentioned the impact of inflation - being a millionaire on paper is not the indicator of wealth it was even 10 years ago - £22m now is equivalent to £1m in 1950.

Here’s how it’s broken down. www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwealth/bulletins/distributionofindividualtotalwealthbycharacteristicingreatbritain/april2018tomarch2020

It seems to me that it’s your disposable income that is a sign of your wealth, not your assets. I’m so glad I don’t live in the South East.

What this does mean is that in future there will be lots more millionaires, the children of those pensioners who will inherit those properties, depending of course on how many offspring there are.
That is why I believe in inheritance tax.

To be honest I’m surprised the percentage isn’t higher but of course as has been said, there is considerable variation around the country.
Here in the Home Counties, as well as parts of London, the figures could well be one in three.

Property always has and always will be a great investment, especially for the medium to long term, and those who saw the potential will now be reaping the benefits.
Inevitably of course there are downturns, 2008 comes to mind but we rode the storm, didn’t panic and sell, and prices recovered.

Who though would have foreseen the large jump over the past three years of a global pandemic? Extraordinary, but driven it’s thought by decent sized houses with gardens being sought after with so many people still working from home.

Neilspurgeon nothing so complex. Look at the proportion of homes in the country valued at £1 million or more. Work out what proportion are owned by people over retirement age. Check what proportion of the population are over 65. Easy peasy maths.

The DT bright young men are journalists not financial whizz kids. My guess is that these figures were researched by professionals in the property market. Probably one of the big estate agents, possible a bank like the Nationwide, who specialise in analysing the property market, or even HMRC.

1 in 4 sounds about right where I live but that’s no great shakes because the majority of the value is in property and pension funds, plenty paid the mortgage off 10yrs ago and now the house is worth 750k
My DIL bought a house 20 yrs ago refurbished it and sold it in March this year for £800k she only 48, husband is a carpenter.

newnanny

I know some will live in houses that have gone up in value but really 1 in 4 millionaires? I know a lot of pensioners and only 1 out of about 20 I know would be a millionaire if she liquidated all assets. Do you know many millionaire pensioners?

The Daily Telegraph lives in the 1930’s. Clearly some boy wonder who works for them has done a calculation based upon what, in accounting, is known as ‘Discounted Rate of Return’. This is what happens when you ignore education and teach diversity, culture wars and other trendy crap rather than the three Rs

Exactly. It's not a moral issue - nobody has done anything wrong, or taken from anyone else. Apart, maybe, from those who got council houses at a massive discount and have seen them rise exponentially. I can't help thinking that they should have been taxed on profit made on sale, so that the money could be used to build social housing for the next generations.

Even that hasn't been an equal situation though. I know someone who bought her council house but can't afford to maintain it. She sees her neighbours get new kitchens and boilers, while her house decays. Ironically, she had her own house until her divorce, when she was left with small children and couldn't work. She wasn't able to claim benefits until the equity she got in the settlement had been spent (and even then it was monitored to make sure there were no treats), which left her unable to pay a deposit on another one when the children went to school and she was able to work again. Her husband, of course, continued to work, used his half to buy another house and carried on as though the divorce was a blip.

You can be a millionnaire in assets, just by having bought a 3 bed Victorian terrace in Battersea when you married 50 years ago - and stayed there ever since.

It doesn't require financial success, wheeler dealing or any other shenanigans. Just buying it, sitting there and not moving

I know of two. One was/is into property in a big way and in an expensive part of UK. The other moved to and lived in Australia for 20 years but worked overseas mostly. Again together with overseas earnings and property investment accrued a lot of funds. Moved back to UK 5 years ago - millionaire! Still works overseas, away two months back for two weeks. Rich but had no family life.

I know quite a few millionaire pensioners here in the SE. A lot of houses here are worth a million plus, and most of my friends have paid their mortgages off.

For most of us, and I think that we are among them, the cause is house price inflation and, in our case we have spent most of our married lives living in areas where prices are going up faster than average. We have been in our current house 25 years and in the previous one 15.

We are also house improvers and three of the five houses we have owned, consecutively, not concurrently, have been, in common parlance 'projects', with us doing most of the work. The houses were cheaper to buy because of the work required, and when sold they were full renovated and achieved top market prices.

grumppa gets it right when he says
Property values have distorted the picture. One handy definition of millionaire used to be someone whose annual income exceeded £100,000. This would probably reduce the 1 in 4 figure drastically.

It certainly would in our case.

RichmondPark
^1 in 5 pensioners in the UK live in poverty. Age UK. This entirely compatible with 1 in 4 being asset millionaires. In fact as I understand it there is an overlap between both groups.

When I worked in the field, I visited a number of pensioners, with valuable houses, and got them benefits.

i always felt uneasy about the morality here, as to why they should get help without having to access the capital in their home, when people in care are expected to sell their house to fund their fees.

There are a number of ways this can be done, Equity Release, a safe option now, unlike previously, mortgage, bank loan or the Local Authority/Governement giving the benefits could put a charge on the house to recoup them when it is sold.

ALANaV. in France, the pensions my neighbours received were over 2,000 Euros a month EACH ..PLUS 300 E bonne de vacance (to help take a holiday !) and 300 E bonne de Noel (to help towards Christmas !)

My goodness, they must have worked in one of those occupations which pay out well for a high pension and the extras.

It is not my case nor that of my female friends.

This is why Macron tried to get the 32 different pension schemes equaled but failed.

kjmpde

i can believe it but those pensioners will be asset rich and cash poor. the only way that the millionaire status will help if they sold their home - but where do they live then

I suppose the idea is that they sell their houses and 'downsize', investing any remaining proceeds as an income, and then the government can remove any pension credits or benefits if the individual is in receipt of them. It might also benefit some larger families - if they can afford to buy such a property.

But it won't do much for the average worker on a basic or minimum wage. And I doubt any money left in the 'national' kitty from benefits being removed would be spent on any social services - for anyone. It would just go back into the general tax bag.

It certainly won't solve the housing crisis.

It's really just runaway house prices
I agree, but only in the right areas. Money follows the money, and the more the house is worth in the first place, due to its attractive location, the more that value will increase.
So say you live in my London postcode, prices have increased by 23% this year. (Ironically where I bought in Devon they have increased by 31% this year due to the covid effect.) Whereas say you live in Scunthorpe, (just saying), prices have only increased by 5%. The geographical divide makes millionaires of some but not others.

Hear, hear Dickens. It suits the rhetoric of our Ruling Class (a.k.a. Government) to have a bogeyman to blame for anything, rather than ask difficult questions about inequalities.
I agree with an income of £100,000 being a more understandable basis for "millionairedom" - if there is such a word.

i can believe it but those pensioners will be asset rich and cash poor. the only way that the millionaire status will help if they sold their home - but where do they live then

I know a lot of pensioners me included and none of them are millionaires, they are not even well off

Something else that gets forgotten when people rail against 'inter-generational inequality' is that pensioners are at the end of their lives, when their 'life savings' are just that - money that they have acquired over the course of decades. Maybe a house that has taken decades to pay for, and a pension made up of decades of contributions. Any younger person who takes out a mortgage, or is paying into a pension, or has a savings account will be hoping to have the same at some point - it's just that they haven't got there yet. Those born of parents who benefited from the expansion in education in the 50s and 60s and live in the South East may get an inheritance, too. If they still feel it's wrong that (some) 'Boomers' are doing ok out of the accident of their birth, they are welcome to donate it to a charity of their choice, but my guess is that most will do nothing of the sort.

growstuff

What about the people who don't own expensive properties in the south, who won't have money to leave their children, whose children won't be able to afford homes of their own, who won't have the same pension deal their parents had, who have student loans to repay, who will retire later than their parents, but are still expected to pay for services such as the NHS and an ageing population through increased taxes and NICs?

The age factor is a distraction because this should be about inequality in all generations and intergenerational wealth hoarding amongst a limited number of families.

The age factor is a distraction because this should be about inequality in all generations and intergenerational wealth hoarding amongst a limited number of families.

This is the point isn't it?

It suits this - and previous - government(s) to preside over a nation divided by huge wealth inequality. A government wedded to market forces and a small-state.; a government which has zero interest in an equitable society for all.

It's all a distraction. These kinds of articles appear regularly in the right wing media... it's either pensioners who are mostly all living lives of luxury taking x number of cruises per year along with buying a new car on the same basis, or it's the younger generation who all want everything instantly and must have the latest technology, avocado on toast, and spend shedloads on eyebrow weaving and clubbing... not to mention the 'illegal' immigrants all living in 5 star hotels with access to the swimming pool and other facilities, and then there's the benefit claimants who, obviously, choose it as a 'lifestyle' rather than getting a job.

Each of these is wheeled out regularly by the media, depending on what the current political 'issue' is and what the government is getting blamed for. So we can all mumble and blame each other whilst the government get on with the job of allowing the very wealthy elite to syphon even more money out of the economy.

Our economic woes are not caused by Aunt Ethel rattling around in her £1million (or just under) house, or the younger generation wanting the latest iPhone (I seem to remember wanting the smallest, whizziest transistor radio when I was young, along with the latest in winkle-picker shoes).

They are caused by a government who believe in the libertarian free-market economy, with minimal state spending, who are dismantling public services and turning them into a commodity, presiding over a nation whose wages have stagnated over the last few decades and who are hell-bent on attracting investors by removing workers' rights so they can be fired and re-hired at will. And removing their right to protest along the way. They want a nation of docile workers, too afraid to speak out, who will be grateful for a job, even a low-paid one, and who will - if they become disgruntled with their lot in life - simply blame the old, the young, the immigrant, the benefit recipient.

I personally will not buy into this crap.

It's really just runaway house prices, our Edwardian semi bought in West London late '80s for roughly £130,000, having added a loft extension we sold it for £440,000 in 2001, Like Dinah's above it recently changed hands for £1.3 million. When I went into the estate agents to pick up the particulars, I was asked "are you interested?" to which I replied "not anymore, it used to be my house couldn't afford it now" People I know slightly further into London, sold a larger version of our house for £2.7 million, bought it in the '90s for £300,000 or so and did spend money doing it up, but..........it's all down to inflated house prices. It is a good excuse to get the hell out of London, which we did 18 or so months ago, there is life beyond the M25, we moved 30 miles, great town, cheaper property, lovely countryside I don't miss the heaving masses and the gridlocked suburbs even though we had great parks and the Thames on our doorstep.