"Generation rent" - did ppl really marry in their 20s and buy a house?

slopemaster

I have seen in a few places lately the statement that people used to marry in their twenties and buy a house - whereas now people cannot afford to buy until much later (if at all).

As far as I can see, this never was the norm - at least for people of my class (upper working class...)
Perhaps for the middle classes?
Or perhaps for a brief period when they were giving mortgages away with cornflakes?

I was thinking through four generations of my extended family and cannot think of anyone who married in their twenties and bought a house!

Mothers parents were in private rented until in their 40s, when they got a council house, where they stayed until they died.
Father's parents owned a 2-bed terrace with outside toilet, bought in their 40s. My parents moved in there when they narried. They had one bedroom, his mum and sister shared the other. (Sister later married, and lived there with her mum all her life.) After 5 years my parents moved to a rented flat, and after another year they moved to a council house, It took them the next 10 years to save a deposit - by which time they were in late 30s.

One aunt lived in a council house down south - too expensive to buy in Hampshire - and only bought her own place when they retired to Wales.
Many of the others lived in council places. An uncle was a sparks (good money) and the woman he married was considered posh; I think she might have had an inheritance to use as deposit when they bought a brand new place . But this was most unusual.

My generation didn't expect to stay with our parents once grown up, so we moved out into crummy bedsits, and gradually rented better places. I married at 30 and we bought a house in our mid-30s. I think it was similar for most of my cousins - they may have married younger, but were in their 30s before they could buy anywhere.

My son is mid-thirties and has recently bought his place.
So what is it that's chenged so much?
Why are we always being told that it should be normal for everyone to buy a house pretty much as soon as they start work?

LydiaJ

Almost all of my friends from uni did. We graduated in the early 90s. The vast majority got a secure graduate job, and within a year or two had bought a house, especially the ones who got married or were otherwise in a couple with somebody to buy a house with.

My brothers (graduated in the mid-80s) all got degrees, got secure graduate jobs, and bought a house (or in one case a London flat) within a year or so, on a single income each (although if the property was big enough they had lodgers while they were single and didn't need the space). They didn't get married until later, at which point they pooled resources with their wives and bought bigger nicer houses in nicer areas.

Buying a house was just the next thing graduates did after getting a degree. It isn't quite like that any more.

Bettie

I was married at 20 in 1972 and bought my first house. I had two jobs, all day in a laboratory and four nights plus weekends in a restaurant. My husband was a manual worker. We saved every penny for the deposit and the repayments were so high we couldn't afford to go out or go on holiday. We did buy a car after a while.
My three children have all bought houses in their twenties. They have all worked hard often with two jobs and one with three jobs to save up. They have a car each as do their partners, they go on holiday several times a year and they all have new tvs, new furniture. We never have credit believing if you don't have the money you can't have it.

PasturesNew

Not many/any in my circles. I bought a caravan to live in, single, when I was 30 and considered to be doing the best out of the crowd I was hanging out with.

My "class" was working class, but well behaved and nicely-enough-spoken.

I left school at 16 with 2 O levels.

slopemaster

LydiaJ wrote: »

Buying a house was just the next thing graduates did after getting a degree. .

Ah, maybe that's it - my son was the first in our family to ever go to uni.
Interesting, thanks.

Savingdad

My mum and dad married and bought a house aged around 25 and neither of them had more than a college education, no degrees or graduate jobs. This was mid 70s in London.

PasturesNew

Elasticmoney wrote: »

Bought our first house in 1980 for the princely sum of £7950 for a new build 3 bed semi.We married the following year on my 21st birthday.This was the norm back in the day.


Our son and his now wife bought is first house in 2012 aged 24

Where I lived, a cheap 2-bed flat cost £21k in 80/81. Single glazing, tiny 2nd bedroom, no CH. Just a standard 1930s build.

setmefree2

I'm one of 5 siblings born between 1957 and 1967 - all off us married and bought property in our 20s. In fact, my eldest sister married at 19, her husband was 22 - both of them were at Uni and they bought a house with their grant money! It was a terraced house in a not too great area but it was still a house (and a home).

d70cw6

Isnt this just a simple case of poorer people dont tend to buy houses whereas more affluent people do?

jjlandlord

slopemaster wrote: »

Why are we always being told that it should be normal for everyone to buy a house pretty much as soon as they start work?

Because politicians are in the business of selling dreams, not facts.

Homeownership only overtook renting in the second half of the 1970s though it was growing since the 1950s, and it was not that simple to get a mortgage.

I don't think it has ever been 'normal' to buy a house as soon as one started work.

lisyloo

I think I'm close to LydiaJ's age group.
We both graduated early 90's. Didn't see the need to get married so didn't do that for 8 years.
We bought a house straight away without a mortgage, but I wouldn't say that was "normal" although it was normal to walk into a good job with prospects.