Ownership amongst the young

Cakeguts

lisyloo wrote: »

My husband was out of work for 12 months and spending everyday full full time looking, then found a job in London, that would pay enough to cover the London costs.

You are seeing things as black and white and life simply isn't like that for many people. You can't just go and pick up any job in your 50s.

Millions of people work in London because they can find jobs there.
Millions commute or stay with friends or stay in tiny studios, boats or air bob. Do you think they would all stand up for hours on trains if they didn't have to. either those millions are stupid or things aren't quite as black and white as you say. I'd plump for the latter.

This sounds like a career choice to me. Are you seriously saying that your husband couldn't find a minimum wage job in an area outside London or are you saying that he could find a job that pays for your lifestyle outside London? Money cannot buy your health. If your husband gets ill what are you going to do?

Cakeguts

ukcarper wrote: »

I don't think it's quite as simple as that and the better paid jobs are normally in areas where property is more expensive. But if you are in an area where your earnings enough to get a big enough mortgage I think you should be able to save deposit.

That is a career choice. Better paid jobs. Who needs a better paid job if they can buy a house working on the minimum wage? It is down to priorities again. Assuming two people working in many parts of the country you can buy a house with two minimum wage jobs. Saving the deposit is easy because the rents are also low compared to pay. The point about affording to buy a house and save is to do with disposable income not how well paid the job is. If you earn £35k a year but all the houses cost over £500k you are never going to be able to afford one. However if you earn £15k a year and houses cost £60k then you have a much better chance.

System

Windofchange wrote: »

Well someone earning £35k is earning above the average. Anyway, off we go again. Same argument, different thread. The other two will be along shortly with their won't anyone think of the nurses catch phrase and some made up numbers. I'm off to bed.

You're incapable of seperating the average wage and average price. They aren't linked in any way.

Once you get over this hump, it will all start making sense.

harebellsinenfield

Brixton was once somewhere people wouldn't touch with a barge pole, when I first moved to London I rented a room there and my father would not stop going on about how rough it was. Now look at it, gentrification everywhere. I am sure, with the affordability of London decreasing significantly, Luton will be the next Brixton at some point.

Graham_Devon

Cakeguts wrote: »

That is a career choice. Better paid jobs. Who needs a better paid job if they can buy a house working on the minimum wage? It is down to priorities again. Assuming two people working in many parts of the country you can buy a house with two minimum wage jobs. Saving the deposit is easy because the rents are also low compared to pay. The point about affording to buy a house and save is to do with disposable income not how well paid the job is. If you earn £35k a year but all the houses cost over £500k you are never going to be able to afford one. However if you earn £15k a year and houses cost £60k then you have a much better chance.

Your assumptions throughout this thread is exactly what is letting you down.

Stick with reality - it's far easier.

lisyloo

Cakeguts wrote: »

This sounds like a career choice to me. Are you seriously saying that your husband couldn't find a minimum wage job in an area outside London or are you saying that he could find a job that pays for your lifestyle outside London? Money cannot buy your health. If your husband gets ill what are you going to do?

Yes you're right it's a choice but NOT an equivalent in either money or fulfilment in some cases,
Enjoyable highly paid work and great social life in London, retire at 55 or flip burgers and have a miserable existence somewhere else.
Most People are going to take the better choice aren't they?

I don't understand your comment about getting ill.
do you mean how will I manage economically?
I have a full time job and an unmortgaged home, so i think I'll be ok thanks, but I don't understand at all what illness has got to do with a choice about where to work.
He is certainly less likely to suffer depression related illnesses by having a decent job rather than being unemployed or considering himself a total failure by being told him career was an entire failure and going onto a minimum wage job.

Yes you are right no-on is forced to live In London and there are choices but for some people that choice might be being a £150k hedge fund manager in London or flipping burgers in Blaenau gwent.

If you are a nurse or a teacher and there are vacancies then you may have an equivalent choice (IF there are vacancies).
If you are a hedge fund manager living in the city, it's much less likely that you'll find a fulfilling equivalent (and I don't just mean money, I mean personal fulfilment also).

So yes no one is forced, but for many there will not be an equivalent job that people can just immediately jump into.
If there are two of you with fulfilling careers then it's doubly difficult.

Many of my IT colleagues tell me there are not a decent choice of good fulfilling jobs outside London. I have question this as some of them come from manchester, Birmingham, but that's what they tell me.

System

economic wrote: »

why does it matter if the average wage earner cant afford the average property?

Exactly.
There is a deliberate refusal to face the fact that house ownership is expensive. Some things are expensive, some are average, some are cheap. There is no reason why every average person should be able to afford every average thing.

The average car was once unaffordable by the average person, as was the average horse or the average washing machine or the average TV.
But most things have come down in price, and cars have been around for so long and are so durable that secondhand ones are still useable and affordable by people with below average incomes.

ukcarper

Cakeguts wrote: »

That is a career choice. Better paid jobs. Who needs a better paid job if they can buy a house working on the minimum wage? It is down to priorities again. Assuming two people working in many parts of the country you can buy a house with two minimum wage jobs. Saving the deposit is easy because the rents are also low compared to pay. The point about affording to buy a house and save is to do with disposable income not how well paid the job is. If you earn £35k a year but all the houses cost over £500k you are never going to be able to afford one. However if you earn £15k a year and houses cost £60k then you have a much better chance.

It's not as simply as that.

ukcarper

harebellsinenfield wrote: »

Brixton was once somewhere people wouldn't touch with a barge pole, when I first moved to London I rented a room there and my father would not stop going on about how rough it was. Now look at it, gentrification everywhere. I am sure, with the affordability of London decreasing significantly, Luton will be the next Brixton at some point.

I think that is why people who could have bought in London in the past cannot now, there are plenty of areas that were rough that have now been gentrified.

lisyloo

I agree it's down to priorities.
Many people prioritise being close to family, careers, money, personal fulfilment, health, being close to grandchildren or elderly parents, friends, hobbies, good schools, church/mosque etc.
Most people are not going to prioritise housing over every other aspect of their lives and it's too simplistic to say they should.