Squashed cramped homes-how do people manage sharing cramped conditions?

breadlinebetty

Depressing article in the DM about the state of the property market in Britain!:( It seems that lots of people are living in overcrowded conditions, and on top of that, property is nosediving all over the country - except for London and its suburbs - which may as well be a different country as far as property prices and stabilty go! Even foreign investors are snapping up London properties, as they feel it's a safe haven to invest their money. The knock on effect is that no-one can buy in London unless they're extremely comfortable!

Here's the article:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2094131/Crowded-House-Britain-Third-dont-space-afford-move.html


So my main question is, besides building extensions - how you make more space in your home?

I'd be keen to know what ingenious ways people have thought up to give themselves more room and space!:j

wnoktnwbr

One in four children is ‘forced to share’ a bedroom, according to the FindaProperty.com website, part of a digital division of the Daily Mail and General Trust.

Huh, if that's what they're using to decide if something is "cramped" then the conditions are probably not as bad as the article makes out. I shared a bedroom with my brother for his entire life -- 14 years -- up until I moved out (end of 2010, I'm 20) and I never in my life thought that my living conditions were cramped. Does sharing a bedroom really qualify as being cramped?

woops later in the article it says:

For a home to be the correct size, which means it is not overcrowded, parents must have their own bedroom. Children under ten can share, as well as same-sex children between ten and 20. Anyone over 21 also needs their own room.

Are there really that many people living in conditions "worse" than this if only 1 in 4 children actually share...

debtfreenow

I'm guessing that a lot of people wait to have children/more children as the case may be until they have a home big enough to house them?

I would be interested personally to hear about people (ie singles and couples) who have found a way to manage when it's time for them to buy their own home, but they are still financially in a position where their income level dictates all they can manage is a room in a shared house or to stay living with their parents. I am starting to see people in their 40s (ie WAY past the age where they should have a self-contained home of their own) still living in parents' home or a "shared house" set-up.

Who has found an ingenious way to move to that self-contained home in those circumstances?

fallenwiccan

I know a couple who have a baby in a one bedroom flat, they make do as she was still training to be a teacher when she became pregnant so is planning to get a job in September and until she is working they couldn't get a larger mortgage to move house. They don't complain, just get on with things and quite like the fact that they know his cot is next to their bed so they're not worrying about baby monitors etc.

propertyman

It's the failure of successive governments to allow development in the south east to outpace the availability of homes, while encouraging more and more borrowing and local activism to prevent development that would have reduced the increase in house prices and rents.

Having our cake and eating it leaves us in this situation.

While we have far less poor living in miserable conditions, there are a lot more only one or two rungs up the ladder and unlikely to have the opportunity to do better, no matter how hard they work or save.

skylight

I used to have a family of 7 in a 2-bed property. I made space by kicking out the ex and his stuff.

The 4 girls shared the larger room and I shared with my infant son. The larger room had a false wall to create a tiny box on the end for the teen to have her own space and a door, the 3 girls shared a bunk and a junior bed. I was looking at triple bunks (3 seperate beds) at one point and also wallbeds/sofas/tables combos for the living room thinking I could move in there to spread the kids out a little more.

You manage. Its difficult, but you get on with it! Being ruthless with stuff helps, Christmas and Birthdays were horrible when one wanted a kitchen or dollshouse that there simply wasnt room for. Good storage solutions are essential - Ikea becomes your best friend if you are not handy with carpentry yourself. Clothes are worn to death and if anything new comes in then something old goes out.

Nothing wrong with kids being "cramped". It was difficult with homework and separating them out, but homework clubs at school helped with that and taking them to the park lots to burn off energy is another essential. The kids are far happier now and friendlier towards each other!

A year ago we moved into a new build 4-bed place. The kids still share, 2 per room and the teen has the smallest on her own. I finally get my own bedroom!! For the first 6 months we rattled around here not knowing what to so but after buying those kitchens and dollshouses for Christmas we are taking up the space now! The kids still swap and want to sleep on each others floors sometimes and make tents and play and all the same stuff that they did when we were in a smaller house - but they love having more toys!

DominicJ_2

Move away from london?
£80k for a three bed terraced round my way.

Go to Ikea for furnishing ideas?

BitterAndTwisted

One in four children "being forced" to share a bedroom is only actually cramped in some well-paid journalist's mind. A journalist who probably doesn't live in London but a lovely, spacious property somewhere in Kent, Sussex or probably Suffolk with several reception-rooms, a bedroom for each child and a spare one for guests. There is no real hardship in sharing a bedroom. It was only-children who had that advantage when I was growing up and they were often seen as unfortunate, not lucky.



"The knock-on effect is that no-one can buy in London unless they're extremely comfortable!"

No change since the seventies, then. And possibly long before that. There was a time when a couple with two salaries might have been able to afford something, but not in the neightbourhoods they would have preferred, perhaps not even in London but much further out. Not unlike today. It's always been difficult-to-impossible for it to be done on one salary alone as I discovered a very long time ago.

mazy_m

ha ha that's laughable 1 in 4 children forced to share!!!

My friend has an 8 year old and a nearly 2 year old, herself and her fiance in a tiny one bedroom flat!!

Now that's cramped!! I used to think our tiny studio was cramped but it's just me and my OH so compared to them we're practically in luxury plus the fact we have a garden so can open the door to not feel trapped they're on the 12th floor of a block of flats!!

*Chattie*

debtfreenow wrote: »

I'm guessing that a lot of people wait to have children/more children as the case may be until they have a home big enough to house them?

I would be interested personally to hear about people (ie singles and couples) who have found a way to manage when it's time for them to buy their own home, but they are still financially in a position where their income level dictates all they can manage is a room in a shared house or to stay living with their parents. I am starting to see people in their 40s (ie WAY past the age where they should have a self-contained home of their own) still living in parents' home or a "shared house" set-up.

Who has found an ingenious way to move to that self-contained home in those circumstances?

If people of our parents generation waited until they had more than a room and kitchen before having children then you wouldn't be here.

The ingenious way of getting a self-contained home is to buy it or rent it?

movilogo

Billions of people in developing world do share rooms with other family members. Even after that they become responsible adults and earn a living in an honest way.

You don't really need a massive house to raise kids.