Was it the "Nice Decade"?

fc123

Great until 2004.
Earnt well, worked hard, renovated house to Elle dec standards. Now being worn out by the tenants...but not for much longer.

OH went stone deaf, survived OP and now has bionic ears.

Would have been greater if we hadn't chosen' to pay for schools.
I still feel it was the right choice, though resentful that what (in terms of quality) we are paying for was free 3 decades ago. So a net loss of around £160,000 just on those.

Losing our rent review and all the other disasters in 2004 were horrid BUT have led us into a totally different way of life (shabby chic style now) which I am enjoying plus has given us the confidence for the next big life change....4 yrs to go once DD is 18.

The planning has started already....we overhaul our current business model in Sept 08.
I do feel priviledged that I can earn a living from something I really enjoy though being self-employed is dead stressy when the cashflow gets screwed.

The only down is that, had the crunch just waited one more year to kick in, we wouldn't have had a drop in T/O and would be debt-free now (the debt coming from being shafted in business not from buying too many handbags.:D ) and the mortgage would have been gone in 4 years.

Strangely, The 90's were better for us.

Different decades of peoples lives, though, have different issues.
I found the 'When the kids were small decade' the hardest on every level.

You off to Jersey for a mini break PN? Sounds fun ...enjoy

morg_monster

The last decade for me has been the "growing up" one, I'm 27 now. Enjoyed undergrad uni, travelling for 6 months, MSc and first job. Moved into rented flat with OH.

Now just when I finally have paid off a few small debts, and now saved enough and am earning enough to start thinking about settling down in somewhere bigger than a 1-bed flat... the fricking credit crunch comes along and while people keep telling me "you're lucky you haven't bought yet ... think how much money you'll save", and I i know i should be happy about that, and a bit of me is, but really all I want to do is buy a place with OH and start that part of our life. But now we'll be waiting at least a year or longer, if i'm sensible. I'm finding it frustrating at the moment!

Basically have spent the last decade watching those older than me living the good "NICE" life. My parents have seen their house more than quadruple in value! YES, I know some of these people might be paying for it over the next few years, but that doesn't really make me feel better on a day to day basis! My generation have seen everyone else have it all, and now we feel its our turn, and all these other people have f**ked it all up for us for now!

oh and i know... I read this forum all the time.. I know this crash is a good thing, the way people were all living on credit in the last decade was unsustainable, and I will be saving money in the long (and short!) run, but when i come from home from work and have to physically rearrange our belongings in our tiny flat to find room to cook, eat and relax, I kind of wish I just knew what the hell exactly was going to happen in the next year or two...

neverdespairgirl

LillyJ wrote: »

I love travelling so much, I plan to have a year career break with my boyfriend (luckily both our jobs allow sabaticals) and just travel, once we have saved up enough (just spent a lot of savings on house deposit!) and before we have kids.

I agree - travelling is great. OH and I did a lot, both together and separately, before we qualified.

When DS is about 5, we are both going to take a couple of months off and take him to India.

neverdespairgirl

Phirefly wrote: »

If I were you (here we go) and I was going to continue living & working as you are for the time being, I'd get my backside over to Jersey, Guernsey or preferably the Isles of Scilly.

I'd second that - the Scillies are amazing.

Sapphire

Good decade for me financially, but feel the preceding times were better. I never felt the previous recession, or even noticed it, really. I do feel that people were generally kinder before this massive 'must-have' greed and materialism took hold of society during this last decade.

I don't feel comfortable with what this 'government' has encouraged in society, due largely to its policies in a whole range of areas (finance, education, immigration, etc). I don't feel comfortable in a society that looks on shallow celebrities (football players and their wives, and other people who have achieved nothing worthwhile) as something to aspire to, or one that wastes so much (on 'renovating', for example, i.e. unncessarily tearing places apart and wasting resources just to add tat to be up with the Jones's).

And so on . . . :rolleyes:

jamescredmond

tanith wrote: »

Just out of interest can those of you who have had an okish or good decade , would you say that would of been the case despite the Labour Government or because of it ? or was it all your own making?

I'd be in a better position to answer this if someone here could explain the precise difference between lab/tory.

to be fair, gov's create/destroy opportunity (subject to external pressures), but much of what happened to me in the last dec. came about as a result of certain choices I made.

and my choices were half-chance. so were everyone else's.

I feel a song coming on.......

jamescredmond

Sapphire wrote: »

Good decade for me financially, but feel the preceding times were better. I never felt the previous recession, or even noticed it, really. I do feel that people were generally kinder before this massive 'must-have' greed and materialism took hold of society during this last decade.

I don't feel comfortable with what this 'government' has encouraged in society, due largely to its policies in a whole range of areas (finance, education, immigration, etc). I don't feel comfortable in a society that looks on shallow celebrities (football players and their wives, and other people who have achieved nothing worthwhile) as something to aspire to, or one that wastes so much (on 'renovating', for example, i.e. unncessarily tearing places apart and wasting resources just to add tat to be up with the Jones's).

And so on . . .

celeb elevation is possibly one area that could separate the 2 main parties.

maybe the cons would've eschewed lab's policy of promoting the superficial and mediocre.

or maybe not.

as power ebbed away from the con's before the '97 election and started to flow towards lab, so did the 'labour luvvies' - all desperate to be seen to be backing a winner and hoping for preferment. absolutely nothing to do with conviction/principle.

now lab. is looking shop-soiled and out of touch, these people are strangely quiet.

let's hope that if the cons win in 2010 they resist the temptation of enlisting the support of the celeb circus.

setmefree2

Turnbull2000 wrote: »

If I'd been born 10 years earlier, then I'd probably be sitting very pretty right now. :mad:

There are a couple of posts like this. I am probably born 10/15 years older than you guys. This is what the "nice" decade felt like from my perspective. Yes, me & Mr SMF2 did get on the housing ladder at 25 - cost of first property £50k (financed with an endowment:rolleyes:). 6 years later sold flat for same money but borrowed just £35k to move to a 2 bed house in a much better area - mortgage now £85k:D.Sweet. So, 2 more SMFs come along, little house no longer big enough. We work hard, long hours but we can't affford to move. Property market is going mental. Eventually, we can afford to move in 2003, this time we have to move our mortgage from £85k to £250k :eek:to gain just 2 extra bedrooms, 6 square feet more of lounge and 40 square feet of garden. _pale_Trust me we had no choice but to move. Waking up owing £250k was terrifying for me. Clearing our mortgage has had to become part of our life.

Now I'm not saying that these are real problems - like being ill.

Low inflation, cheap chinese goods and full emloyment were nice, but I'm not sure the property boom was that nice.:o Looking back - I'm not sure it was so great to have to worry about borrowing large amounts of money, then worry that you have to keep pulling in massive amounts of money to pay for it.

Life's not easy, I know that. But the "nice" decade - no, I'm not sure about that.

setmefree2

baby_boomer wrote: »

It's been an amazing, candyfloss decade for public sector workers

Totally glad for them;). They deserve it.:D

LillyJ

morg_monster wrote: »

The last decade for me has been the "growing up" one, I'm 27 now. Enjoyed undergrad uni, travelling for 6 months, MSc and first job. Moved into rented flat with OH.

Now just when I finally have paid off a few small debts, and now saved enough and am earning enough to start thinking about settling down in somewhere bigger than a 1-bed flat... the fricking credit crunch comes along and while people keep telling me "you're lucky you haven't bought yet ... think how much money you'll save", and I i know i should be happy about that, and a bit of me is, but really all I want to do is buy a place with OH and start that part of our life. But now we'll be waiting at least a year or longer, if i'm sensible. I'm finding it frustrating at the moment!

Basically have spent the last decade watching those older than me living the good "NICE" life. My parents have seen their house more than quadruple in value! YES, I know some of these people might be paying for it over the next few years, but that doesn't really make me feel better on a day to day basis! My generation have seen everyone else have it all, and now we feel its our turn, and all these other people have f**ked it all up for us for now!

oh and i know... I read this forum all the time.. I know this crash is a good thing, the way people were all living on credit in the last decade was unsustainable, and I will be saving money in the long (and short!) run, but when i come from home from work and have to physically rearrange our belongings in our tiny flat to find room to cook, eat and relax, I kind of wish I just knew what the hell exactly was going to happen in the next year or two...

I am young too (23) and I don't sit around wishing I was 10 years older!! I was born when I was, and I am only around for (hopefully) 80 or so years so I need to make the most of it!
That would be like people who lived through the war being bitter towards those born after it (although I think their experiences were a bit worse than not being able to get a mortgage).
Your life is your own, it is not to be compared to others, and it is what you make of it.
I am afraid I don't feel any animosity to those who you think have messed everything up for our generation. It has happened and we can't change the past.
Work hard in life for you and your family, be happy, be thankful for your health. Don't complain that life isn't fair, cos it isn't fair and we all have to put up with it. However it is a hell of a lot less fair for those who were unfortunate enough not to be born in the wrong decade but the wrong part of the world.
I am afraid when you put things in to perspective, our generation in Britain are some of the luckiest people on earth.