Find out how Gransnetters helped their DC get on the property ladder

Just read OP and realised that there were a lot of questions I didn't answer.

There was no Conversation to be started. It just happened. DD went to university in South London, in the early 1990s when there was a huge property price slump but rents remained high and we worked out, that if she bought a 2 bedroomed property and rented a room out it was cheaper to buy than rent. She bought her flat for half the price it had been sold for 3 years previously.

We put little or no money into her house purchase but our most important contribution was DH acting as Guarantor for the mortgage. If she didn't pay he would. DH was checked out to see that he could afford the extra mortgage, as if he was applying for an extension to our own mortgage. As well as that we did all the property hunting, except viewing, helped her sort out all the formalities and acted as removals van, purchasing agent and decorators and plumbers. She (and her brother, later) each contributed £5,000 from money they had from regular savings we had made since they were born and a small legacy.

With DS 4 years later, it was different. House prices had risen a lot and he was in an expensive area. Here a fortuitous legacy helped. This provided 2/3rds of the price of a property and I took out a mortgage in my own name on the balance. DS supplied the deposit from his £5,000. Ownership was in our joint names. He actually paid the mortgage and all the costs of running the flat. An unexpected job change meant he needed to move out after 2 years. By that time the price had risen further and were still rising so as the mortgage was in my name, I took over paying it, paid him back his deposit and his share of the price rise and then renting it out commercially while he moved to a region where prices were lower and he was able to buy without any assistance from us as a first time buyer.

The key to the assistance we gave our children, which was financial facilitation, rather than actually giving them money, was that DD bought right at the bottom of a housing slump and DS bought when prices were rising, but had not reached their peak. Another year after DS bought and we could not have helped either of them as prices would have been too high.

No legal problems at all, we both fully understood what was required. DH just had to prove he could afford to act as Guarantor on DD's property. I bought DS's first flat jointly with him, with no exact share specified at my lawyers recommendation. This was so that if I died DS would own the whole property without it being included in my estate.

Emotions didn't enter into it. We did it to get our children on the housing ladder before prices rose too much for us to do this. We wouldn't change anything we did. We got both children on the housing ladder, at minimal cost to us and them when prices were low, but circumstances in the housing market have changes so much that what we did is not repeatable.

My parents helped me onto the property ladder but deposits are so high now that it is difficult. I will give my son my inheritance from my parents. It is grandparents who can help the most as I hope my son will be in his sixties before I pass away.

I helped my son with his deposit when he purchased his house but I have not yet been able to help my grandsons. My sister did Equity Release to help her son get the deposit for his house and it means she has no value in her property now. I don't want to do this as I worked hard to buy my house and I do not want to give it up for a fraction of it's cost.

I bought a house for my in-laws back in the 80s and suggested that they leave it to my children rather than me. That certainly gave the children a hefty start on the property ladder. Best thing I ever did.

not got our own children but nieces live in their parents buy to let homes at a reduced rate to get them on their way and to get used to paying their way, bills, general living costs etc.

My DH partners family gave them a deposit to purchase.

We were lucky that we could help our 3 DC with a deposit for properties many years ago. Today property prices are so much higher. Our youngest son bought his flat about 15 years ago. He still has it and uses it as an investment now, it was the best thing we could have done for him. Our older DC we helped about 20/25 years ago. We gave them each the money as a gift. My H and I both retired early and had the cash from selling our businesses, and we inherited some money from our parents around that time too. We were lucky we could do it. And so were they!

Just helped my youngest son buy a very dilapidated but cheap house - we paid full 5% deposit and he is paying us back very gradually. Of course we have also helped out with paint, decorating , moving etc. We are glad to help but it has meant that our holidays will not be abroad for the next couple of years!

When my son and his now wife decided to get married we wanted to help them move out of their rented accommodation and buy their own house. We had both recently retired so we gave them a one off lump sum of £10,000 out of our savings for their deposit. They were astonished and thrilled. First they moved house, then they got married. The other in-laws were not in a position to make contribution so it limited the kind of property they were able to buy but it meant they could become home owners on the property ladder. My only sadness was that they bought a house really close to her parents instead of closer to me. But once you give away money it is not your business to direct how it is spent.

When my daughter's 12 year relationship broke down which was 6 weeks before her wedding and they had got a house together some years before, it had to be sold, and she moved back in with us for about 6 months, but we heard of some flats nearly ready that were half ownership, so we gave her the money we had saved up over the years that would have been for the wedding and gave this to her for a deposit. Her partner's mother was so upset she wrote us a cheque for all the deposits we had put on all the various things such as the cake, photographer, the hotel venue room, etc. etc. so that is the only way my daughter received any money from us, as with our own house unless we have to go into a care home, then it will be given upon our death.

I didn't help my daughter buy her house as she had a 100% mortgage but I did help with money in fixing it up. I paid for her boiler and the leaking roof in my DGDs' bedroom.

We helped all 3 daughters with their first home purchase. They all received the same quite considerable sum. We were able to do this using money my father had left me; he would have been more than delighted that his 3 grandchildren had benefited from his legacy.

I lent my daughter a deposit out of my share of savings in a divorce settlement and she paid me back . She paid for the rest of the house with the government help to buy scheme at the time but she needed a deposit and I was happy to help

I was not in a position to help at the time but recently inherited some money. I was able to make use of a deed of variation to alter the will in favour of my children to help reduce their mortgage.

I helped my son and his girlfriend with their deposit by gifting them £5000 as they had a baby on the way and I didn't want them having to rent as I knew buying would be cheaper in the long run. I had been left money from my Dad who passed away. As my Dad was very careful with his money, I knew it made sense to put it to good use and it also gave me great pleasure seeing them move into their house and even more exciting when my grandson came along.

We have helped our three children with their first house purchases, giving them each the same amount of money towards a deposit. This money was from down-sizing ourselves to a small bungalow.

We helped my grandson with the deposit for his first house as he and his partner had a baby at a very young age. They have both worked hard and recently married and moved to a larger property. I hope I will be able to do the same for my other three grandchildren when the occasion arises.

One, married, no children, got himself stuck working abroad and unable to bring his wife back here, through finding this impossible. The other two, married, a child each, had terrible trouble with this, despite all being highly educated, hard working and sensible with money. Eventually, they got their own homes but the mothers have to work full-time, despite breastfeeding and emotional turmoil of this. They can't live nearby because of their jobs. They were proud and ashamed and would not ask for help but eventually let me give £20K each towards their deposits, which doesn't help much. However, I have been able to help with my daughter's baby, which helps against the additional cost of childcare. It's tiring but I love doing this. At all levels in society, housing is in crisis. No wonder so many are on the streets. We need a seriously funded branch of the police to act kindly to help the homeless and to gather statistics towards working out how to help. However, we all know what is needed: strict controls on those who could provide housing as after the 2nd World War, without this being dismissed as a Leftist idea.

Like others have said, our two AC scrimped, scrambled and scurried to get on to the property ladder. My daughter and her husband rented from us at less than market rate so that they could save. They have twice bought rundown properties, worked all day and came home to renovation and decorating tasks and every weekend too. They sold the first place, it was tiny, and then bought another house that had been neglected (we were horrified) which a year later is a stylish and artfully decorated home. They are staying put now a while thank goodness. We lent them £5000 because whether it lies in our savings account getting .01% interest (or whatever) or 'saved' with them is neither here nor there to us.

My son needed only moral support in that I sat in on mortgage advisor meetings (he was young). I will never forget the mortgage advisor's face when he asked my son how much deposit he had and he proudly said £3000. Which did buy him a tiny flat 15 years ago, and he was off.

As an aside, we have a young nephew and his girlfriend who lament not being able to afford to buy, but they are off for 'city breaks' every other month ...

We will help our five buy properties if and when they are interested in doing so. At the moment they are more into seeing the world. None of them appear to be thinking of house buying as yet!!

Living on edge of London and none of our 3 have left home yet. 20-27.
We want to downsize and help them move to a shared place of their own at the same time. But don't know really where to start to be sensible and legal and not make things harder for them all. Do we have a share in property, do a loan? We need to consult a solicitor I think next year.

I helped my daughter and her partner with her deposit on a flat using my savings.
We did not use solicitors at the time but did suggest that they signed an agreement stating that in the event of a split, each of them would get back what they put in before any profits are divided. This agreement was witnessed by friends of each party but I don’t suppose it would stand up in court!
Once they had completed we also helped with decorating, curtain making etc.

My son and daughter in law lived in a home I owned (and had previously rented out) at a rent just enough to cover my costs. After about 5 years they asked to buy it from me, which they did, for the amount outstanding on the mortgage and significantly below the market value. This was all done formally, it was a good solution for all of us. I only have one child, so it’s better he benefits when he needs it, rather than waiting to inherit.

Three years ago when my husband retired we gifted £10K to our daughter as a deposit on a new build, affordable housing property from his pension payment. As someone has previously mentioned under the terms of the mortgage it had to be signed over as a gift which was arranged by the solicitor dealing with the purchase. As she is single she would never have been able to afford the deposit for a property otherwise. We bought a few items for the new house and she funded the rest herself and as it’s only a small two-bed property it’s about fully furnished now and she pays all her own bills etc.

We have 2 children and offered them both either money for a wedding or money for a house deposit. Both chose the latter. They bought their first houses about 10 years ago, and then we helped them both again - about 5 years later - to buy their next homes, which were more suitable to accommodate their children. This helped them to increase the deposit to 40% so that they could get a more favourable mortgage rate. We took the money from our savings and didn't make any formal legal agreement, though had an understanding that, if the relationship ended, the money would go to our son/daughter, not the partner. This worked well in my daughter's case when she broke up with her first partner. We regarded the money as a gift, and don't expect any return of this money. We also try to give them a small sum of money each year for home improvements, as they both live in expensive areas and bought properties needing considerable financial input! We didn't have any help buying our first house in the mid 1970s - just had to work and save for our deposit, so in many ways our children have been more fortunate.