3 Million Older owners Want To Downsize But Can't

[The Masked Tulip]

Fivelive was just reporting that baby boomers in 3 million houses want to downsize but can't - the reason being a lack of smaller cheaper housing. Apparently if such housing existed then the baby boomer houses would be snapped up by all those who currently don't have a home.

Clearly price is not the reason.

It does tie in with what I have been seeing though and makes me, more and more, question the idea of chasing the "biggest house you can afford" mentality.

Apart from the cost of buying and running there has to be the question now - except in the most desirable locations - of whether you can sell. If the baby boomers cannot now sell what will things be like when they have died off?

Looks like the UK needs many more immigrants with large families.

[MartinE]

Boomers I know - downsizing means going from 4 bed detached to 3 bed detached bungalow. (Need space for grand kids to sleep)

No wonder they find it tough.

[The Masked Tulip]

According to the report it is half of the over 60s. Report wants millions of retirement flats built.

[btl_hater]

According to the report it is half of the over 60s. Report wants millions of retirement flats built.

Make sure it's on some green belt land so they can have a nice view. I'm sure they won't object to that.

[ccc]

In a lot of cases they more or less want a 'swap' with those who are selling the smaller place to get somewhere larger.

Clearly price is the major issue here. I can't stand when i hear 'can't sell my place'

You can't sell it FOR THE PRICE YOU WANT. Very different.

[@contradevian]

Probably the same boomers that oppose any kind of development too.

[supersonic]

they can downsize, they just need to learn that they can't make money in the process.

[onlooker]

According to the report it is half of the over 60s. Report wants millions of retirement flats built.

I realized this was an issue 3 years ago when my family got a dog, and I ended up doing most of the dog walking in our neighbourhood. I got to notice, for the first time, who lived where. I would say about half the properties are under-occupied, with many houses occupied by quite infirm elderly people who would be better off in flats or even care homes. As a result, I am very cynical about the need to build huge numbers of extra houses in the UK, just use better what we have already.

[Stop The Ride]

In a lot of cases they more or less want a 'swap' with those who are selling the smaller place to get somewhere larger.

Clearly price is the major issue here. I can't stand when i hear 'can't sell my place'

You can't sell it FOR THE PRICE YOU WANT. Very different.

You can stand it. You just don't want to.

[The Masked Tulip]

In a lot of cases they more or less want a 'swap' with those who are selling the smaller place to get somewhere larger.

Clearly price is the major issue here. I can't stand when i hear 'can't sell my place'

You can't sell it FOR THE PRICE YOU WANT. Very different.

I wonder what the growth in immigration is required to off set the baby boomers dying out over the next 20 to 30 years is? I have no doubt that all future govts will open the flood gates.

Give it 100 years and the British will be an entirely different people. Just like when those ruddy Anglo Saxons came here.

I think it will take a decade or more before baby boomers realise that younger generations simply cannot afford the asking prices.

In my part of the UK now there are simply far more houses on for silly asking prices than people who can afford to buy them. Most just sit there year after year and even if IRs rose substantially I doubt that many would be forced to sell having bought so long ago at a fraction of current asking prices.

Such people will be carried out of their homes or the homes sold to pay for care. No wonder nursing home fees have soared.

[The Masked Tulip]

I realized this was an issue 3 years ago when my family got a dog, and I ended up doing most of the dog walking in our neighbourhood. I got to notice, for the first time, who lived where. I would say about half the properties are under-occupied, with many houses occupied by quite infirm elderly people who would be better off in flats or even care homes. As a result, I am very cynical about the need to build huge numbers of extra houses in the UK, just use better what we have already.

I have viewed loads of big 3 and 4 bed houses on for silly asking prices that are wrecks inside. The owners could not afford to modernise them and keep them modern. Nine times out of ten the last occupant was an elderly person who had gone into care or who had died. These are always in the 'best' parts of Swansea.

It constantly reminds me that if these people could not afford to keep such houses up to date bearing in mind how much they paid 20 to 40 years ago, what hope would there be for someone paying their ludicrous asking prices today?

On the other hand, virtually all the smaller 'cheaper' houses I have viewed in less salubrious suburbs have been clean and modern on the inside. Many you could move into without having to do anything.

[The Knimbies who say No]

The biggest retrograde step from the Brown-Osborne bubble is the fact that the country is becoming more dependent on inherited wealth. Many of these big homes wont have a family in them again until the occipants die.

[onlooker]

I wonder what the growth in immigration is required to off set the baby boomers dying out over the next 20 to 30 years is? I have no doubt that all future govts will open the flood gates.

Give it 100 years and the British will be an entirely different people. Just like when those ruddy Anglo Saxons came here.

I think it will take a decade or more before baby boomers realise that younger generations simply cannot afford the asking prices.

In my part of the UK now there are simply far more houses on for silly asking prices than people who can afford to buy them. Most just sit there year after year and even if IRs rose substantially I doubt that many would be forced to sell having bought so long ago at a fraction of current asking prices.

Such people will be carried out of their homes or the homes sold to pay for care. No wonder nursing home fees have soared.

Modern genetic data points to the radical view that the Anglo Saxon invasions were numerically very small, and that the pre-existing population of England (subjugated by the Romans) were already Germanic. They were Belgae according to Julius Caeser, so the clue to their affinity is in the name. It is a Celtic victimhood myth that the Welsh and Irish owned all of Britain before the Anglo-Saxons arrived.

Nursing home fees will be the challenge for the future. But the replacement population is already here - primary schools are bursting, haven't you noticed?

[The Masked Tulip]

The biggest retrograde step from the Brown-Osborne bubble is the fact that the country is becoming more dependent on inherited wealth. Many of these big homes wont have a family in them again until the occipants die.

I doubt, unless there is a need to be sold for care fees or death taxes, that even then many such houses will just sit there on the market, especially if there are greedy relatives.

[justthisbloke]

I have viewed loads of big 3 and 4 bed houses on for silly asking prices that are wrecks inside. The owners could not afford to modernise them and keep them modern. Nine times out of ten the last occupant was an elderly person who had gone into care or who had died. These are always in the 'best' parts of Swansea.

It constantly reminds me that if these people could not afford to keep such houses up to date bearing in mind how much they paid 20 to 40 years ago, what hope would there be for someone paying their ludicrous asking prices today?

On the other hand, virtually all the smaller 'cheaper' houses I have viewed in less salubrious suburbs have been clean and modern on the inside. Many you could move into without having to do anything.

I live in a big place but, despite being able to afford it, it ain't been "modernised". The bathrooms and kitchens may be old but everything works and probably will do for decades.

I've never understood this mania for chucking out perfectly functional stuff every 5 years.

In the 20+ years we've been here, we've painted the outside twice and a couple of rooms inside once.

[winkie]

Boomers I know - downsizing means going from 4 bed detached to 3 bed detached bungalow. (Need space for grand kids to sleep)

No wonder they find it tough.

....Number of bedrooms can be deceptive......there are many a four bed house that are smaller than a three bed bungalow, even bigger taking the size of the plot into account....

[winkie]

I doubt, unless there is a need to be sold for care fees or death taxes, that even then many such houses will just sit there on the market, especially if there are greedy relatives.

Yes,.....could be quite a wait......not giving our inheritance away!.......but who will/can buy it if a growing working family who needs it doesn't have an inheritance..... they may have a 'possible' inheritance in another 50 years but inheriting something in your 70s or 80s is no good then, a time when in the normal pattern of life someone would be looking to downsize.

[interestrateripoff]

According to the report it is half of the over 60s. Report wants millions of retirement flats built.

Won't they all want to live on the ground floor?

[Mrs Bear]

Boomers I know - downsizing means going from 4 bed detached to 3 bed detached bungalow. (Need space for grand kids to sleep)

No wonder they find it tough.

In maybe their late 60s my folks downsized to a bungalow,not because they particularly wanted a bungalow but because it was all they could find in the area they thought they liked.

3 years later they moved again,having realised they didn't like village life after all, back to a house. And they said that living without stairs for those 3 years had noticeably decreased their fitness, which soon came back once they were up and down stairs several times a day again. My mother stayed in a house until she had to go into a care home at 89, but even then was still well able to manage stairs. I do realize that she was lucky, but it would seem that avoiding stairs before you actually need to will not do much for your mobility.

[The Masked Tulip]

In maybe their late 60s my folks downsized to a bungalow,not because they particularly wanted a bungalow but because it was all they could find in the area they thought they liked.

3 years later they moved again,having realised they didn't like village life after all, back to a house. And they said that living without stairs for those 3 years had noticeably decreased their fitness, which soon came back once they were up and down stairs several times a day again. My mother stayed in a house until she had to go into a care home at 89, but even then was still well able to manage stairs. I do realize that she was lucky, but it would seem that avoiding stairs before you actually need to will not do much for your mobility.

That is very interesting Mrs. B.

[olliegog]

have you looked at the prices of 2 bedders? - often one can buy a 3 or 4 bedroom property for roughly the same price probably because as escapees from the 'bedroom tax' have found 2 and 1 bedroom properties (unless you are talking about flats which no-one wants) are a bit like 'hens teeth'.

[Orsino]

Fivelive was just reporting that baby boomers in 3 million houses want to downsize but can't - the reason being a lack of smaller cheaper housing.

What the boomer generation should be campaigning for is secure, long-term tenancies and guaranteed rents. Most asking prices I see in London and the South East are equivalent to about 25 years of rent but the average boomer is not going to live until they're 90. Some kind of rent insurance scheme could work out nicely for both the boomer and the landlord, freeing up the lump sum they're clearly hoping for from selling their existing house. Renting would remove maintenance costs many can clearly not afford, and it would give them flexibility if they needed to go into a care home. Maybe it would also save their children a headache and possibly inheritance tax when they die.

Of course I doubt that boomers will be able to detach themselves from their generation's home-owning fetish. Many children would see it as squandering their inheritance too. From a selfish perspective perhaps I'm glad. It means I'm not competing for rental accommodation with pensioners - although I doubt many would want to live in central London.

[campervanman]

Thread title = ignorant anti boomer nonsense. The article refers to people over 60 of which boomers only represent those aged between 60 and 68.

Apart from that, the article dispels the hpc generational bigot myth that older people want to stay in houses that are too big for them. The lack of suitable housing for older people is just another feature of the dysfunctional housing market in the UK and will be resolved if and when the market is allowed to function as a means to provide a home for people and not a conduit for bank profits.

[campervanman]

The market is being twisted more and more, this is what FLS and HtB are now adding too. And does anyone think HtB will stop? On the news yesterday a young girl used HtB to purchase her flat (assume it was a flat) as she could not save up the deposit ... how on earth in 5 years will she have saved enough to repay the 20% 'free deposit' ...

In Greater London you see lots of flats with bunk beds in the second bedroom and a cot in the main bedroom for sale at ridiculous prices as they try to get enough money to buy a ridiculously priced house. The flats would suit older people and clearly the houses would suit families but neither will/can move because they can't afford to.

Maybe a thread titled Generation X/Y causing further HPI by taking government 20% deposit bribe?

[SleepyHead]

My heart f***ing bleeds for them.

How awful, to be trapped in a HOME.... A BIG HOME...some people have really got it tough.