Redistributing wealth between the generations

Each generation faces different challenges. There have always been some who inherit wealth at a young age and can live comfortably, just as there have been those who struggle. Yes, we lived through redundancies, high interest rates on mortgages, illness and uncertainty. Do I want my children to do the same? Well, no of course not. Do I accept there is an inevitability that they will find life is full of ups and downs? Yes, of course. Will I help them if I can? Yes, of course. Do they demand it? No, they don’t. My ma in law was fond of saying ‘ young people want to start where their parents finish’. She was, in my view, a wise woman.

I’m not sure about people’s faith in their children inheriting their money after their death to enable them to buy a house.
Nobody knows how long they are going to live. What about Care Home fees?
If you die in your nineties (assuming you have some money left) your children would probably be in their late sixties or seventies before they inherit. It might help to fund their own Care Home fees, but a bit late to be using it as a deposit on a family home.
And again I ask, isn’t it all very unfair on the large number of people who will never receive an inheritance?

We bought our house in 1978 for £15,000, it is now worth £400,000, My daughter, 38 and son in law have a beautiful family home and a massive mortgage, My son, 35, worked since he was 16 cannot afford to get on the housing ladder as he is single, he lives with us, hopefully one day he will find a partner and be able to afford something together. At some point we will downsize and the children can have any money we make from the sale, certainly don't want the government to have any of it, they have already stolen 2 years of the pension we paid in for............

Therefore according to Shelter:
a four pint carton of milk would now cost £10.45
a chicken would cost £51.18
bunch of six bananas would cost £8.47
six eggs would cost £5.01
a loaf of sliced white bread £4.36
a leg of lamb £53.18

So we can see that the cost of living is far, far less today, just to feed ourselves we needed to spend a much greater proportion of our salaries on food. And of course the cost of televisions, all white goods, electrical goods (kettles etc), clothes, and many other items are all proportionally cheaper.

Shelter says house prices have risen 43 times since 1971. This includes all housing across the country.

House gone up 100 times since 1971, really!

Point one. The govt, who was voted in by many, decided to land many 21 year olds with tens of thousands of pounds worth of debt - not a surprise then that debt has little meaning.
Point two. Foreign holidays are so much cheaper now than they were in our day. I think Ryanair just offered me Spain for £10.
Point three. I am so grateful I didn't have small children and a zero hours contract, no sick pay.

Icanhandthemback. Clearly a lot of schemes are not helping the first time buyers otherwise there would not be so many youngests in rented accommodation or living with the parents. What I think has always been unfair is when one buys a car / boat / caravan or most things on HP it is agreed a regular monthly payment. However with a mortgage the companies can carry out all the checks they want as to be able to afford the repayments. Then a short time after taken on the mortgage the interest rate can rise and the companies don’t give a dam if the buyers can afford the increase. I think the monthly payments should remain the same for the duration of the mortgage.

From the article in the OP:
" But trying to figure out which generation, if any, is more deserving is not straightforward. Should we look at a snapshot, or a life cycle?"
Rather than doing that, I would prefer that the 'rich' should be more heavily taxed. There are still plenty of them, from my recent observations.
But I don't think that's going to happen with the current Tory grip on the economy.

Neither set of parents could afford to help us, we had long engagement, bought small terrace with sitting tenant, all we could afford, . all our furniture was either given or bought from second hand shop (makes me laugh when tv progs go on about recycling)
O.K if you can help do so but neither of our children expected help anymore than we expect help when it comes to paying for being looked after in our dotage, although have heard it being discussed by them so don't think we need to worry.
I will add we do child care so they can work without worry but we really enjoy having the grand children, anyway.
supergran54 my thoughts exactly.

driverann, many people got caught out with 100% mortgages when they wanted/had to move but found the value of their properties had fallen. There are several schemes available to young people to buy a house, some of which require smaller deposits or effectively give you a 100% mortgage.

SuperGran, My children were reared together, equal love, parenting and teaching and yet one is now hopeless with money and the other amazing. Where did I go wrong, please?

First time buyers should be offered 100% mortgages like we had when we moved into our first house in 1972. Then there would be no need to rob mum and dads bank.

I cannot believe how rancid people are being on here. Clearly there are some GPs who are being taken for a ride by their children who expect childcare on tap, help with deposits, free lodging while they save - and show no gratitude while living the life of Riley. However, this applies to precious few of the DCs I know. I would either be happy to give my DCs what they asked for within my remit, or just say no. And eg, one of my DCs earns £1500 after tax, NI and student loan deductions and mandatory pension contributions. Yes, it's London, but that's where his promotion took him. He pays £750 for one bedroom in a flat in the suburbs (all inc) £50 for travel and around £50 on food (makes his own lunch and takes in his own coffee). Yes, he has a mobile phone - £28pcm - but his work needs him to have one and know all about social media as part of his job. Buys train tickets to see us and friends ahead of time - poss £80pcm. Ancillary expenses (clothes, chemist) including presents - he's at peak wedding - poss £70pcm. So he clears just under £6000 a year. It would take him 13 years to save enough for the average London first time buyers deposit - and longer if he took one holiday or a meal out in all that time.

He hasn't asked, but if I can help him I will like a shot.

Some of our children have grown up in middle class homes without money worries. They have enjoyed holidays abroad and some electonic gadgets. I think this makes it harder for them to adjust to possibly humbler jobs than their parents and living more simply. In a sense this is not their fault at all. Four of our children are good with money and are sensible financially and one isn't!!

The difficulties faced by this generation are just different from the difficulties faced by previous generations. I suspect if you had the information, you'd realise that each generation feels slightly superior to the next and the younger generations feel more hard done by.
Previous generations have been lucky to have had the extended family to rely on, maybe not financially but certainly with help in childcare, etc. Similarly, many young wives were not expected or even allowed to work whereas these days, if you want any sort of a life, you really do need both parents to work. I do think they are lucky to have 9 months of paid maternity leave and up to a year off. I had to go back after 12 weeks and it nearly killed me, more emotionally than physically but breast feeding soon tailed off!
Every generation has it's own challenges but somehow they muddle through.

We have given our son the deposit for a small house as a gift, which he has bought and is managing a mortgage. We decided to do this because we saw no point in him waiting for an inheritance when we are dead, while the money doesn't even grow due to pathetic interest rates.

He needed the money now, and we were were happy to release money and help him start a new chapter in his life. It has given us great pleasure to see how happy he is, and he was (still is) so grateful for what he sees as a 'miracle'.

Yes, we worked hard to be where we are now, and don't resent him sharing in what will be his anyway, albeit sooner than he might have expected. He works very hard himself - saving for a deposit while paying high rent in flat was never going to work.

We lived with my parents to save for deposit. Both worked full time , paid my mum £15 week for ‘keep’ and lived mostly in our bedroom watching a 12 inch black/white tv. We had one holiday in three years ( Scotland) and never went out for a meal in all that time. Aftet three and half years we had money fir a deposit but couldn’t afford to buy in my home town ( where we were living) so went up to husbands home town of Bedford , where we were able to afford.We had no cooker, no fridge, no table or chairs, no sofa . We had a bed and a one bar electric fire. (no central heating). We cooked on a primes stove that was lent to us.... or turned the fire in it’s side and heating pan on it. We finially got a cooker after six weeks.... the fridge took three months, the table and chairs a year! No guests then!! We had trays on laps!! The washing machine came after two children( and it was real nappies then). The young now!!! They’ve got NO idea.

I have NEVER been able to afford to buy my own house and rent from a HA as I've done since 1980. My daughter and her husband can't get a high enough mortgage to buy a house, (average house/flat prices range from £225,00 - £395,000 for a 2/3 bed house), so they also rent.
We have both fought hard for everything we have and my daughter and SIL decided quite early on that owning their own house was not even a dream so they concentrate on living the best life they can with 4 children, 1 who is ASD/ADHD and the youngest who has multiple life threatening allergies.

For those people who think that the world owes them a living, live a month in their shoes, on a single wage, and see how they feel afterwards. I'm pretty sure that they'll realise just how good their own lives are!

My d has always worked hard and we have never had to help her apart from when she first started work and we paid her travel fair and lent her money for the first month till she got her first monthly wage.
She paid it all back to us too.

We bought our first house with a 100% mortgage as I worked for the Corporation before baby was born. Hubby had just finished his apprenticeship at 22. His wage was £21 a week and the mortgage was £21 a month! We had a baby to feed and pay all the bills withmwhat was left. No holidays or car or nights out. We managed.

I can remember being so stressed I cried when we heard interest rates were moving up to 11%. There were only endowments or repayment mortgages then no fixed rates so we were at mercy of ERM. My parent's helped us by giving us deposit of 5% when we had first child as we were living in one bedroom flat. We were so grateful. In the past it was hard and without help from my parents I don't know if we would have been able to buy our own home. In turn we helped my daughter out when she wanted to buy a house with her partner (now dh). It is hard for children now to buy property but I think most parents would offer to help their children if they were in such a position to do so. This is redistribution of wealth.

Oh Welshwife, how very true. Wheeling home Off cuts of carpet on my wheelbarrow to lay over the hardboard which I had nailed down having filled the gaps between the floorboards with newspaper to insulate the freezing house.

Taking the ashes out each morning and laying the fire before cycling to work

It was tough, but now I own our four bedroomed semi-detached where I regularly have the grandchildren to stay.

I wouldn’t change anything

I wonder though. If young people stayed at home until they found a life partner didn't do anything much and saved every penny whether they would have enough for a deposit? Not that I am suggesting that they do this, but if they did would they then be able to afford a house? I read recently of a very young couple who had managed to buy recently who had a similar story. Of course this is a different era and things have moved on. When I told my GD daughter recently that we didn't have computers when I was young she exclaimed 'Then I feel sorry for you!'

As an example of how house prices have inflated

And I've another, Witzend

The house in which we lived as children, in a garrison town in Essex, was sold by my widowed mother in about 1973/74 for £9,000. The people who bought it from her stayed there a long time; they sold it about 3 years ago for over £200,000...

As the Mail article I posted earlier pointed out, if wages had kept pace with house price inflation over the years a wage of, say, £4,500 in 1973/4 would now be £100,000. But it isn't...

No amount of self sacrifices will help many of today's youngsters get on the housing ladder.