I purchased my house 10 years ago, I’ve never missed a payment and my income has increased in that time, but I couldn’t afford to buy my own house now 🤯

My wife and I started out 40 years ago in 1984. It was the easiest thing to get a mortgage even though we were not big earners. I can still remember how excited people were when their homes grew in value by £1000 each month. Even though I knew nothing about finance, it seemed obvious to me that this was a bad thing. My heart bleeds for our young people. You are a good man Gary. I wish you success in your honourable campaign.

*YES YES AND YES* I live in Bulgaria - officially the poorest country in the EU - BUT... Most families here raise 2 kids quite happily on 1 income...!!! 85% of people own their own home with no mortgage. 65% of families have a house in the village for weekends and food growing. Kids get free school meals, old people do the child minding for free, food is more expensive than the UK but people still buy quality food not processed crap. The QUALITY of life for working people is way higher than the UK £££ =/= Quality of life. >>> Its what you can DO with that money.

*WHEN I WAS 24 IN 1994* I bought a 3 bedroomed stone terrace for 2.5 X my salary, I had a Toyota Supra Twin Turbo, and I was at restaurants and clubs every week. *THAT WAS NORMAL* I feel SO sorry for kids today, I know kids in the Uk who never go out, they save every penny for a deposit and they just get further away each year.

My mum was decluttering paperwork the other day found an old tenancy agreement for a 3 bed house in East Ham (East London) where we lived about 22 years ago. The rent was £650/month. Went on Zoopla and found rent for 3 bed houses on the same street today are at least £1,800 but others are over 2k. First hand example of real comparative numbers and more than 3x price increases but wages remain virtually stagnant in contrast. Absolutely outrageous!

I have just turned 40, I have done everything right. Got a job at 18, bought my own house at 19, worked hard, only ever had a handful of sick days, climbed the slippery pole. Started a family. I am now earning a decent wage especially for where I live, however I have less money in my bank at the end of the month then I have done in any part of my life.

My husband and I are in the same boat as another commenter- couldn’t afford to buy the house we are in now. It’s ridiculous. When we first started out 20 something years ago we were chasing 2-3% annual increases and that was at times soul destroying. We were also lucky to be helped by family. Without significant help young folks today stand zero chance. This has to stop. Thank you Gary for speaking up.

This was excellent. My Mother in her 80’s is so critical of her youngest daughter for ‘not saving enough’ like ‘her generation did’ to get on the property ladder.

The BEST example i always give for what you are correctly explaining Gary is to look back at your own Family. So i look back at my situation growing up. Dad worked, Blue collar Engineer on the Trains(when i was a kid) he just did Night School after he left School so no University/Degrees ect. Mum stayed at Home looking after us Kids and Homemaking. We could afford on that single Wage to buy our Home, have no Debt, have savings, a decent Pension Pot, have multiple Holidays a Year, a family Car and although we were by no means Rich we were you typical Working Class Family on a Council Estate we didn't really want for things that we actually needed. Can you do that today on a single Working Class Wage? Not a fookin chance in Hell can you, no way at all.

I bought in 1997 for less than 40k whilst earning around 16k. Today the same job pays around 30k but the house is valued at 210k. The same person in the same job could not buy the same house. That's a sad state of affairs.

Nice little analysis of how we as a community are getting poorer, but feel as individuals our life is getting bit better, so it's OK. They divide us, we must see ourselves as one.

We have sleep walked into an economy where ordinary working people are dependent upon income from government to rise to a minimum standard of living , food banks are a standard form of help and hundreds of thousands of children are living in temporary accomodation and falling behind with education. My father managed to buy a 3 bed house as a single income lorry driver and had money left to have expensive hobbies and the cost of living ....I can see it why doesn't everyone ?

The thing with fighting back, especially in these exciting times, is that people with existing power are increasingly less bashful about wielding it; trying to erode any checks and balances and basic rights to enable them to just go full authoritarian despot if they experience resistance. With non-violent protest increasingly criminalised and a legacy media telling people who aren't the greatest consumers of information that everything is fine, it feels like this is going somewhere very dark indeed.

I'm 73, my parents emigrated from London UK to New Zealand where i was born and raised. Gary's snalysis is correct, but there are wider sociological and political nuances that underlie the differencès between the 4 generations. Just briefly, post WW2, most western democracies provided the returning Servicemen with jobs, subsidised housing, and the benefits of nationalised free Healthcare, ftee education for the children, and the ost war hrowth of the 1960's and 1970's. These were political, policy-driven decisions by Governments. Of course most people's lot improved. 1980's saw the permicious reach of neo-libetalism, Austerity promoted as 'the only solution' and the festruction of the working class and rise of globalisation. These realities have been MASSIVE. Ive watched it all and am appalled. It seems to me that our whole economy and political institutions have been hijacked from us. We are still blinking "'What happened?" But, as a woman, ive got to say that i do believe that women's lives have improved. My Grandmother [Edwardian era] had 11 children.

my aunt - teacher - and her partner - probation officer - bought a 4-bed townhouse on 'the most desirable road in London' (Foxtons 2012 quote) in '87. 270k. That was 5.5 times their salaries. Sold for a cool £1.2m about ten years ago. The buyer converted it into three flats: 600k, 650k, ground+ garden £700k. The ground floor flat alone is 10x the combined salaries of a teacher and probation officer today. Facts.

We think it's great when TVs drop in price every year, but also great when house prices go shooting up. Bizarre.

I'm 38, I've been working in a trade for over 20 years. I've never been able to rent on my own, because there isn't enough work, I can't charge enough for the work I do, to cover that lack without pricing myself out completely. I feel like a star trying to burn iron for fuel and failing. I'm so tired. I have no savings, I live with my mother. I feel like the harder I've worked, the further from any independence or freedom I am. I need to rest. I don't mind making a living, but when does the living start?

I feel that many people fail to understand that house appreciation makes richer only people with multiple homes. If you have only one home your wealth in practice doesn't change, even if prices go up, because if you sell it you won't be able to buy more of a similar house somewhere else (where prices are comparable ofc). And you need to live somewhere. It is like taking off clothes before stepping on a scale and being happy that you loose weight 😬

So true. It’s exactly what is happening. We are in our 70s now and our children are in their mid 40s and they certainly cannot make the life choices we were able to do at their ages. Dread to think what life for our grandchildren will be like.

Well said, Gary! The system is geared up to increasing the wealth of the already wealthy at the expense of working people, through debt and cost inflation of essential assets. At the end of their working life, the younger generation can expect poverty in old age under the current system.

I've lived in my home for 20 years, £121k, nudging £300k now, like many others commenting I couldn't afford to live here now. I'm not certain how I feel about it all, I'm grateful I bought when I did and I was able to do so but I also feel guilty that its so hard for a lot of other people.

I'm one of the left behind, having always been single and on a low wage. For those younger or with children you need to be starting up Community Land Trusts (CLTs) in your area, and shaming the local authorities, land- bankers, to turn over usable land. There is no way you should accept the prospect of an affordable home as a vanishing dream for the younger generations. Politicians and the big corps won't solve this for you. Unless you want to be visiting your children and grand children in single room, single family households, akin to the student accommodation being built today....

Love the parental comparison! I’m 25, my parents are 43 and 46 (had me very young) In 1998 they bought a 3-bed semi detached house in Hampshire for £88000, with a £5000 builders incentive (so they didn’t have to put up a deposit) and all they had to pay was £100 in fees They were 18 and 21 at the time, my dad was at the beginning of his career and my mum had just started her job too so both on the basic of basic salaries. They bought a house at 18 and 21 with a newborn baby (me) Imagine that situation now, both of you on a he minimum wage, a child, and you’re living at home. There’s a comparison of “how’s my kid doing at my age” I’m 25 and I’m still at home saving for that £40/50k you need down here just for the deposit. They were married at 27/24 years old and had 7 year old me and we went on holiday every year. Things were more affordable and that’s just in 2004 A bigger kick in the teeth is that the £88000 house they bought, if it stayed in line with inflation, should cost about £160-170k today. Its market value is £350,000 … how do we compete ?

This is absolutely true. I'm going to be mortgage free in about 18 months which is about the same age as my parents were (early to mid-50s) but my mum and dad had two kids. I don't have any. Me and my partner are in far higher status jobs then my parents but we are poorer than they were at the same age. We feel richer though but when I really analyse and compare we aren't. Looking at my niece, on my partner's side, she doesn't own a house and has rented for the last 7 years or so and probably paid upwards of £50k in rent (we live in South Yorkshire) but isn't on the property ladder. At the same age, my partner had her first house. So over three generations (my parents, me and partner, our niece) we can definitely see we are poorer at comparable ages in our lives.

In the last 35 years for example from experience= Housing has risen 14x in the Republic of Ireland and around 18x in most of Canada but in the North of England around 6 or 7x. Young people may have more bobbles and bells and whistles and mobile phones but less chance of Bricks and Mortar.

When I lived and worked in London 20 years ago rents and house prices were already beginning to rise fast. I moved abroad for personal reasons, having not bought a property. The media played up house price inflation and some owners were renovating and flipping houses for profit. Nobody ever talked about the purpose of a home, especially for people wanting or having families. House prices going up was never called inflation. Property owners were happy to see value on paper increase and yet if they were to sell, their next property to buy to live in would also have increased - where is the net gain? And why should housing serve as an instrument for profit anyway? People said nonsensical things such as that their (actual) home was their pension.

I move from a high inflation country to the UK 23 years ago. I couldn’t believe how relatively low the cost of living was in the UK. That has changed. Yes, we earn bigger numbers than ever before, but we have no surplus income after paying expenses, so we can’t accumulate assets, so we remain with only with our labour to sell, in a situation where inflation-adjusted salaries have fallen. Good luck getting laws changed. There is also another strategy people can use: family asset accumulation. Families pool their income & buy properties (get legal agreements in place so it’s fair). Working class Families must work together to accumulate assets & never sell them. They also need to get financially educated so that they never get into consumer debt, and be forced to sell assets.

I understand what you’re saying and agree. But the bit at the end about we get together and say we don’t except this is for the birds. This unfortunately is nothing to do with left or right politics. The very wealthy control whoever is in power. Right,they win,left,they win. Like in the US big corporations buy politicians and as you say, will create the illusion of helping the poorer.

Great video. Thanks for sharing your views. The data shows this is a worldwide trend and it is clear that, globally, the wealth gap is growing and the wealthy is forecast to gain even more under the current conditions. The problem for the UK is that much of its so called "crown jewels" infrastructure type assets are in foreign hands (e.g. City of London commercial & residential properties, Rolls Royce cars, Heathrow Airport, Gatwick Airport, Thames Water, Premier League football clubs .. etc) and this will accelerate its economic and social decline.

I'm with you Gary. Thanks for the work you do.

Loving the graphs!! Visual aids really do your subject matter justice. You’re like a weatherman for economics.

I bought a house in 2020. I can see now that I have escaped the crisis of living prices but little did I know how long, dull, expensive and worrisome paying off the mortgage and owning a home will be. Saving for deposit since 2016 in rented rooms was a piece of cake in comparison and personally I felt no stress back then. Getting on a property ladder is just the beginning of a very long and stressful process, especially if your salary is not high. When I have to remortgage in a couple of years I'm not so sure if I will even be able to afford my own house!..

Another great video Garry. It would be interesting to determine the "break point" - the level of income, above which you actually improve your level of affluence, and conversely below which your impoverishment increases. Ans what is the impact of taxing the super rich on this break point.

Great video! I really think you are tapping into the route of the problem. The increase in inequality not only means that the rich get richer but the poor MUST get poorer. It's like there is a pie and the elite just accumulate more of it vs the working class - there is no 'extra pie'! Interesting because there is this contradiction then between there being a finite amount of real value in the world then, but seemingly an infinite amount of money which can be created. If the money represents the social relation of power over another, does it mean that there is no limit to the amount of power one can accumulate over another?

Wish everyone explained this like you do Gary - you need to take this global.

Thank you for showing this and explaining it so clearly. It’s probably also worth pointing out in as simple a way as possible, the cost of buying/renting a property as a proportion of salary. That is a real eye opener for most Boomers!

Aw Gary! I wish you had more reach....you speak with such clarity its refreshing! You dont fancy getting into politics, no? Youd make a great chancellor! Keep going dude and your reach will grow!

I don't know anyone old or young who feels they're getting richer. Not in my town. I think everyone knows deep in the back of their mind that their getting poorer and their society is poorer.

Gary's messages are and must be heard❤100% Legend.

Thank you, Gary, for another super informative video exposing the myths of the wealthy, and Trickle-Down Twattery. For some of us, it’s like playing the game of monopoly where some of players are given very little money to start the game and are required to play against those with an abundance. I hope going forward you can do some videos about how a progressive tax system would work too. Thanks again.

The graph really helped me to get the concept. Thank you. I hope your book goes crazy and more people find tour channel

Very interesting topic, great insights :) Comes down to purchasing power.... real wages haven't kept up with inflation for decades. Means on paper 100 dollars is now worth 50 in "real" terms.

Man you explain this stuff so clearly. Fascinating and also very worrying. I feel like you and Martin Lewis should team up.

Thought-provoking video as always. I get that taxing the very wealthy more would hit their purchasing power, but I no longer believe that tax in and of itself funds anything. Since the money that eventually became our tax payments was first created from thin air by banks typing the numbers into an account somewhere to purchase something, that tax is merely returned as revenue to HMRC, whereupon it is deleted from the economy. The system is set up so that free market enterprise ends up with all the money and whilst the private sector is important, so is the public sector. All parties seem to want to entrench the fallacy that only the rich can save us, but that's not happening. Our fiat currency system is being abused in plain sight, because there's always enough money for war but never for council housing which would allow young people a chance of moving out from their parents' houses and getting some independence

Construction developers build houses not for the sake of providing ordinary people a place to live, but because investors invest money in construction. In my country, real estate investment is becoming increasingly popular, where even with just 100 euros, one can start investing. It common when a bunch of people buy a property and sell it later or let to get their profit. This drives up prices, and people who want to buy a home for their family to live no longer can, as speculators inflate the prices, it seems that banks getting involved in this too.

Gary ,I love your closing comment " send it to your nan" .......thing is nan will probably read the Daily Mail and start talking about 'illegals '.

So happy to have you back mate, I always look forward to your uploads and I missed it when you wasn't here.

This is very powerful when combined with the weaponisation of gratitude. If you can't say "thank you for appreciating my skills and giving the promotion and a pay rise, but I'm not happy to have got this promotion later than the person before me, it pays less in real terms than they received and I'm paying more tax" with sounding ungrateful how can you challenge it? I know there are some who would say organised labour, but is there another way?

Thanks Gary! Our eyes have been opened.

The problem with older people like us is that we paid for our houses thinking we could down size. I would love to sell my house but when I see the places I would rent the amount of money for a one bedroom apartment is more than all my house expenses for a four bedroom house. If I sold my 🏠 I could not afford to live elsewhere. Even if a got a container house it would be difficult because I would need to buy land outside of the city.

Another great video Gary thank you so much, looking forward to more videos and reading your book Some how we have got to fight back and demand our economic rights , you need to be in politics gary , I’m hoping people with get together in huge numbers take on the government, I’m 70 but I fear for my children and grandchildren what hope is there for them

This feels a lot like being in a Casino, where the house is statistically designed to win and take your money over time. Yet in a Casino you have the option to not enter the building and play. While in this system you actually can't leave and you're forced to play until you lose everything. And if you complain they call you socialist or communist, and point at the person that just won at the roulette and say "see the system works, you can make money, you're just (insert insult)".

When 35 years ago my parents got their house for 100k on a single middle class income. When we got our house we could barely afford the 600k mortgage as two working professionals and had to save up for years and get loans from both sides of the family. Similar 4 bed house in the same area. WTF

As some who has worked with my hands all my life I can tell you I'm glad that was short , as always gazman , there is a lot of good info there my bro , good work . Thank you .

My grandmother was paid below average and climbed the London property ladder thanks to Right To Buy. She now owns 3 detached houses, rents 2 & lives like a multimillionaire. Thankfully, she is aware that the economic conditions were much better for house buying.

Really clear, well explained video. Good to have you back Gary

My income despite increased responsibility has declined in real terms over the last 15 years...

You are a total inspiration Gary. ‘Power to the people!’ ❤

I’ve had an insurance payout for life changing injuries I had in an accident. I’m about to buy a house outright, so, in a way I’m lucky. My body is screwed though, so I’d rather just go back to how things were. 🤦‍♂️ Before the accident I was earning above average wages. If I was to try and buy the same house now, the mortgage alone would be 80% of my take home pay!

This makes complete sense. You explain it very well. I had thought about his roughly before when thinking about my own circumstances. My grandfather could buy a house, raise a family with 5 kids and buy a new car every few years as a working man off a single wage. (Council worker doing grounds maintenance) My mother and father both worked and were able buy the council house we were in. Now I am in social housing myself with no chance of buying in the future by the looks of things. ( I feel lucky to have that and not be paying extortionate private rents). That graph shows it perfectly. Time to start eating the rich I think. When will they have enough? They are hoovering up everything. The next generations are going to feel lucky when they have a plate of food on the table.

Look at the comment to views ratio! Nice! I always comment and like to support this important work

this is a superb explanation with great insight.

That graphic brings fond nightlife memories! Seriously and more on point, Gary has very good insights but when you have a powerful hammer everything looks like a nail. Inequality is more of a consequence: there are 2 main events that put us on the current course, if I may say. The first was the end of the gold standard in 1971 and the second was the 1973 oil crisis. From then on stagnation and wage devaluation started creeping in. You need two or three decades to truly feel the decline of a society. Said decline has been cushioned by credit, cheap money, and cheap goods from globalization. And guess who has ultimately benefited from that. And who has lost.

My plan to get around this and help my children out is to buy some land and build my own home on it once I've cleared my mortgage around age 50. Refuse to get another mortgage after this one! They can live on my land rent free, even if it's just in a caravan/mobile home as long as they need or want to. They will never be homeless and will always have the option to not be a rent slave to some millionaire. From day one the property/land will be in some kind of trust so it can't appropriated for care costs etc. It's not a glamorous solution, but it's the best I can do for my children at this time.

And remember people, even if your home increases in value, the only way you can get that money is by selling your home, stripping your family from that asset.

Good video Gary! Carefully chosen graphs and figures like this are a great addition to the channel!

That’s really cleverly put. Well done. I can now put into words something I’ve never quite I understood. Thank you.

Gary what you say is so true, and even more so for older people like myself whose grandparents were born before Irish independence so grew up in grinding poverty and deprivation as there was massive wealth inequality in the UK, and they had lived in generational poverty for centuries as did all of their community because they were Irish Catholics. Now only one side is still in the UK since the border was drawn up splitting apart their province where their families had lived as neighbours for generations My father grew up with no electricity, running water, or even a pair of shoes. His brother started work in a coalmine at 15yrs old, yet he still could get a roof over his head and raise a family of five children, in a tiny townhouse where he still lives. But he has taken in some of his grandchildren as they can't afford a house - although Ireland is now a 'rich' country and they are 'better off', they can't live in their own country just like the peasants of old who were forced out by poverty and famine under British rule Edit: I wonder how much the scale of the UK's wealth inequality and reliance on immigration was not noticed by the public in Britain when the poverty was in Ireland, and Britain was a wealthy country with a supply of cheap labour from a poor country. After independence the UK govt introduced the common travel area, so the Irish could still fill low paid jobs in Britain working as navvies, skivvies, tattie hoakers etc.

A clear and brilliant explanation - thank you Gary.

Well done Gary. Keep up the amazing work you're doing👍

Gary: You should do a video which discusses both Nominal wealth, asset values, etc and those in Real Terms. The effect of inflation is mostly ignored by the media in their reporting, and the majority do not grasp their real wealth changes.

Excellent Gary. Keep getting the message out👍👍

Thank you, Gary.

This hints at a future economic system I’ve only considered, and would be an interesting novel: the only things you can truly own, you make yourself. Your body/mind/free will, and your creativity and utility. Everything else is living standards, which could become completely un-stratified, and then class becomes a pure skill based class society, with only 2 levels. A very broad acceptable one, and a class of true ownership limited by ability. which is what a true Merit Based society should be right? It’s an idea.

Thank you, Gary. You’re doing a kindness

Fascinating! Ive never seen or heard this concept before but it makes perfect sense.

Found my old Council rent card the other day. In Feb 1990 my rent for a 2 bed semi nr Wigan was £19.65 per week. My Rates(Last few months before "Community Charge" i.e. Council Tax) was £9.95 per week. £30 per week for rent AND Council tax..........£120 per month for rent and Council tax. By the mid 90's the rent was still only £25 per week, got the old rent cards here as proof.

Totally agree, if you calculate everything as percentages or multiples it becomes easier to compare. Bills as a percentage of income say, or house prices as a multiple of salary

The purchasing power of the £ has collapsed.

Good morning Gary. Really nicely explained 👍🏽 best regards, Phupinder

Fantastic video Gary

GARY! You should host a podcast with other experts where you discuss potential remedies for inequality. The problem is clear. What we need is a robust solution and a solution could take on many forms, each with their own potential pitfalls P.s I love the work you’re doing, the book was great, please keep up the good work .. we need you

Really appreciate your content Gary. You come from a humble background but understand the economic climate and share with others on a way that makes sense. Certainly agree that big corporate and the super rich are the ones who need to be taxed more and not us the working class. Let's hope for a reform of structure on how this system currently works.

Never seen it explained this clearly before, thanks!

excellent explanation, really clear

that graph is superb, and i would suggest even understates the problem by having the same gradient on the generational bands - they are surely flattening (as well as starting from lower baselines). For 99%

Great explanation!

A great video, but none of the major parties want to do anything about it. And it looks like the Reform party is a waste of space as well as they are not interested either.

Very well explained! 😊

Great video Gary;-) we the people need to know all this thank you for your time;-)

Congrats on 100k subs and the new book! I'll probably get the audio book and listen to it while i run :)

Gary! You have enough money to turn the heating on! Great analysis!

Thx Gary!

What an incredible way of looking at this. I have never thought of it in this way.

Excellent analysis, Gary.

It always confuses me when people say that they're richer because their house price has increased. This only works if you own a house as an investment to be sold later. Otherwise, when you come to sell your house, you also have to buy another house, which will presumably have risen in price by the same proportion. If you're looking to upsize, the gap in cost between your current house and your new house will be larger. You are therefore going to find the transition more difficult than if they had both stayed the same price. The problem is a lack of basic numeracy.

Smart, simple, well presented ❤

My elderly parents have been conned they are middle class simply because they own their house. In reality they are working class. Asset rich, cash poor. The youth are disillusioned that no matter what they do it will be a struggle to afford a family or property. Thus reducing population and ability of government to meet future debt payments due to less working/tax paying individuals. The country as a whole (gov and private) is debt laden. The government can't use inflation to reduce debt because public/corporations can't afford additional payments, even though rates are historically low. I think the government will print money again in the next downturn but instead give direct to those in need of support. Different from previous QE. This obviously has issues and is not solving the central problems - just kicking the can down the road. The main problem is the property prices and rents are currently unaffordable and it is going to get worse. The age comparison is simple and impactive 👍.

Excellent insight and explanation. Critical concept

i'm a middle manager in a tech company that's booming. my wage has doubled in my ten years working in this industry. theoretically i'm like the neoliberal dream child and my life should be thriving. basically nothing has improved in those ten years though - the wage doubled but so did the cost of everything else. in 5 years rent has gone up over 50% in the suburb i grew up in so now i'm 18 months into living with my in-laws... i'm 31 years old sorry, not to sound all "woe is me". obviously i am very lucky to have a career, lucky to be able to move in with in-laws etc. but that only makes it more clear how horrendous it must be for millions of people in this country