It can take quite a lot to dislodge a bedroom-blocker. Despite their irritating name, the Intergenerational Foundation has hit on a really good idea in its Hoarding of Housing report. It says that those of us who have been clinging on to large family houses should be given an incentive to move on and move out.
And there are a lot of us, with more than a third of homes in England “under-occupied”. The study claims that 25 million bedrooms are empty in England’s homes – and oldies are to blame.
According to another report, by the English Housing Survey, 51.5 per cent of over-65s live in homes with two or more bedrooms they don’t need. And we single oldies are the worst squanderers of living space. Half of all single households where the owner is aged over 60 have three spare bedrooms or more. Which is very naughty of us, because there are young families who badly need our homes – children would use those empty bedrooms.
The foundation’s idea is that old people who move into a more manageable property should be let off paying stamp duty.
That would have been really helpful back in May, when I downsized. For I, too, had been a limpet. I was utterly attached to my family home, which was gorgeous: rambling, five storeys, ivy- and wisteria-clad, with a nice garden. It had everything a family could enjoy – and fill.
Each of my three children had a bedroom, which became their private realm. Joshua, my son, filled his with bits of obsolete technology he couldn’t bear to part with. Em and Becca, my daughters, filled their shelves with books and photographs. And my late husband Desmond Wilcox and I crammed every remaining nook and cranny with ornaments and souvenirs, files and furniture we had collected over 40 years.
The place was a memorial to all our happiness, a museum of love. But the children grew, as children will, and two moved out. The au pair left. I was left with four empty rooms echoing in the floor above mine. And then a buyer came along.
They were a lovely family with three children, like mine. Mrs New Owner fell in love with the house, just as I had 23 years before. I printed out the history of the house for her and her children ran happily around the garden, playing exactly where my own had played. And then, helter-skelter, the children ran up and down the stairs, picking out their own bedrooms. I felt the house smile and grow warm again. A family home needs a family.
I realised then that I had no god-given right to the place. My mother had set me an example by moving from her family house to a flat, and had blossomed there, freed from some of the worries that go with blocked gutters and a leaking roof. So I followed her example and found myself a little two-bedroom flat, one bedroom for me, one spare. (The foundation does permit us a spare room, just in case.)
At first, I admit, it felt like living in a timeshare, because it was devoid of memories and I’d had to get rid of things I had treasured for years. But five months later, I don’t miss any of it. Surrounded by just my best-loved paintings, I love them all the more.
I kept an album of photographs of my old home, and of my children in the garden, which I labelled – self-pityingly – “Loss”. But there are new children living there now. In time they too will move on, reluctantly, no doubt, but looking forward to the future. I have moved on, and am looking forward, not back. I am a bedroom-blocker no longer. And a good thing, too.
Esther Rantzen
NO, says Jan Etherington
There’s somebody at the door. Oh, it’s the Property Police. They’ve come to arrest me for refusing to move out of my house, which they’ve decided is too big for me. Any minute now, someone will burst in to measure my floor space; too much square footage and I’ll be forced out and into a broom cupboard or an attic.
I am spitting feathers at the most bullying, patronising and downright offensive report by the Intergenerational Foundation (IF) – a bossy charity whose contention is that “British policymakers have given undue advantages to the older generation at the expense of younger and future generations”. Which translates as “Get the oldies!”.
The report accuses pensioners of “bedroom-blocking”, and suggests that older people in big houses must downsize and move to smaller homes to free up the stagnating housing market. Quite aside from the cheek, this argument doesn’t make sense.
If those of us with big houses move out and buy smaller ones, surely we’ll be depleting the stock of more affordable housing available to younger buyers? And if we try to sell, who is going to buy the bigger houses? Property developers, who can knock them down.
The IF (surely it stands for Interfering Fools?) witters: “More than half of adults over the age of 65 live in homes with two more bedrooms than they 'require’.” Who decides how many bedrooms is a requirement? Do they believe a couple require only one? It’s not necessarily true, what with snoring, insomnia and general nocturnal incompatability.
It goes on: “It is understandable that retired people 'cling’ to their home, long after it has outlived its usefulness…”. I’m not 'clinging’ to anything – except my knuckles, to stop me punching anyone with an IF lapel badge. I’m living – and working – in the house I love, and it has five bedrooms. Reckless extravagance!
My husband and I bought it years after the children had moved out, because, as comedy writers who work from home, we wanted the space. I have four grandchildren. Every room is used regularly and… hang on! Why do I need to justify this? It’s my house and I’ll damn well live where I like. But they’re still going to try to bribe us to downsize by urging ministers to offer tax breaks.
Why not just put everyone over 60 in the Big Brother house, because Big Brother is alive and well and working at the Intergenerational Foundation. Listen to this: “There are profound social consequences to their [over-65s’] actions, which are now causing real problems.” And this: “We believe that each generation should pay its own way, which is not happening at present.” Off to the Diary Room with the lot of us!
How dare they insult a generation of babyboomers? Far from selfishly squatting, Scrooge-like, in Downton Abbey splendour, clutching a pile of money and ignoring the hardships of the younger generation, we’ve paid our own way all our lives – and other people’s, too. Everyone I know in this age group is helping and supporting their adult children – and often, their parents as well – even though our own pensions and savings have been decimated by gross mismanagement in the financial markets. As the economy darkens, we need those extra bedrooms because our adult children – and in some cases, grandchildren – may one day move back in.
Trying to bully and shame us into downsizing won’t work. Except, here’s the irony. My house in Richmond is up for sale. Not because it’s too big for us, nor because we’ve been intimidated into moving by this ludicrous report, but because we fancy living by the sea. Probably in quite a big house.
The foundation’s idea is that old people who move into a more manageable property should be let off paying stamp duty.
That would have been really helpful back in May, when I downsized. For I, too, had been a limpet. I was utterly attached to my family home, which was gorgeous: rambling, five storeys, ivy- and wisteria-clad, with a nice garden. It had everything a family could enjoy – and fill.
Each of my three children had a bedroom, which became their private realm. Joshua, my son, filled his with bits of obsolete technology he couldn’t bear to part with. Em and Becca, my daughters, filled their shelves with books and photographs. And my late husband Desmond Wilcox and I crammed every remaining nook and cranny with ornaments and souvenirs, files and furniture we had collected over 40 years.
The place was a memorial to all our happiness, a museum of love. But the children grew, as children will, and two moved out. The au pair left. I was left with four empty rooms echoing in the floor above mine. And then a buyer came along.
They were a lovely family with three children, like mine. Mrs New Owner fell in love with the house, just as I had 23 years before. I printed out the history of the house for her and her children ran happily around the garden, playing exactly where my own had played. And then, helter-skelter, the children ran up and down the stairs, picking out their own bedrooms. I felt the house smile and grow warm again. A family home needs a family.
I realised then that I had no god-given right to the place. My mother had set me an example by moving from her family house to a flat, and had blossomed there, freed from some of the worries that go with blocked gutters and a leaking roof. So I followed her example and found myself a little two-bedroom flat, one bedroom for me, one spare. (The foundation does permit us a spare room, just in case.)
At first, I admit, it felt like living in a timeshare, because it was devoid of memories and I’d had to get rid of things I had treasured for years. But five months later, I don’t miss any of it. Surrounded by just my best-loved paintings, I love them all the more.
I kept an album of photographs of my old home, and of my children in the garden, which I labelled – self-pityingly – “Loss”. But there are new children living there now. In time they too will move on, reluctantly, no doubt, but looking forward to the future. I have moved on, and am looking forward, not back. I am a bedroom-blocker no longer. And a good thing, too.
Esther Rantzen
NO, says Jan Etherington
There’s somebody at the door. Oh, it’s the Property Police. They’ve come to arrest me for refusing to move out of my house, which they’ve decided is too big for me. Any minute now, someone will burst in to measure my floor space; too much square footage and I’ll be forced out and into a broom cupboard or an attic.
I am spitting feathers at the most bullying, patronising and downright offensive report by the Intergenerational Foundation (IF) – a bossy charity whose contention is that “British policymakers have given undue advantages to the older generation at the expense of younger and future generations”. Which translates as “Get the oldies!”.
The report accuses pensioners of “bedroom-blocking”, and suggests that older people in big houses must downsize and move to smaller homes to free up the stagnating housing market. Quite aside from the cheek, this argument doesn’t make sense.
If those of us with big houses move out and buy smaller ones, surely we’ll be depleting the stock of more affordable housing available to younger buyers? And if we try to sell, who is going to buy the bigger houses? Property developers, who can knock them down.
The IF (surely it stands for Interfering Fools?) witters: “More than half of adults over the age of 65 live in homes with two more bedrooms than they 'require’.” Who decides how many bedrooms is a requirement? Do they believe a couple require only one? It’s not necessarily true, what with snoring, insomnia and general nocturnal incompatability.
It goes on: “It is understandable that retired people 'cling’ to their home, long after it has outlived its usefulness…”. I’m not 'clinging’ to anything – except my knuckles, to stop me punching anyone with an IF lapel badge. I’m living – and working – in the house I love, and it has five bedrooms. Reckless extravagance!
My husband and I bought it years after the children had moved out, because, as comedy writers who work from home, we wanted the space. I have four grandchildren. Every room is used regularly and… hang on! Why do I need to justify this? It’s my house and I’ll damn well live where I like. But they’re still going to try to bribe us to downsize by urging ministers to offer tax breaks.
Why not just put everyone over 60 in the Big Brother house, because Big Brother is alive and well and working at the Intergenerational Foundation. Listen to this: “There are profound social consequences to their [over-65s’] actions, which are now causing real problems.” And this: “We believe that each generation should pay its own way, which is not happening at present.” Off to the Diary Room with the lot of us!
How dare they insult a generation of babyboomers? Far from selfishly squatting, Scrooge-like, in Downton Abbey splendour, clutching a pile of money and ignoring the hardships of the younger generation, we’ve paid our own way all our lives – and other people’s, too. Everyone I know in this age group is helping and supporting their adult children – and often, their parents as well – even though our own pensions and savings have been decimated by gross mismanagement in the financial markets. As the economy darkens, we need those extra bedrooms because our adult children – and in some cases, grandchildren – may one day move back in.
Trying to bully and shame us into downsizing won’t work. Except, here’s the irony. My house in Richmond is up for sale. Not because it’s too big for us, nor because we’ve been intimidated into moving by this ludicrous report, but because we fancy living by the sea. Probably in quite a big house.
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