Pensions vs Property: a dreadfully difficult dilemma (part 1/3)

Like many young people, including fellow Mouthy Money blogger Andrew, my goal is to buy a house.

It’s my aim, my dream, the point in my life where I will turn from young person to fully grown adult. Yes, my parents will be (significantly) helping me raise the deposit, and, yes, the bank will own approximately 75% of it. And, yes, I will probably find it costs me far more than I expected and will probably never pay it all off but IT WILL BE MINE.

My house, my castle, my (highly probable) box in an ex council block in deep, dark depths of outer, outer London.

“We are all far too obsessed with getting on the property ladder when we should be focusing on saving in pensions.”

Recently, there have been a lot of stories in the news about how young people aren’t saving enough. How we spend all our disposable income on  iPhones (mine, incidentally, costs me £10.20 a month) and how we are all far too obsessed with getting on the property ladder when we should be focusing on saving in pensions.

Earlier this year, PR agency MRM published its annual Young Money report which focuses on the pensions vs property debate. At the launch event, Julia Rampen, editor of Mirror Money Online made a really good point in her opening statement; when buying property “not only do you have to save four or five times your income, with the possibility of being able to sell your investment at some point down the line, you also have to commit to sharing with someone who you might not get on with in a few years’ time.”

“I am seriously looking at spending the best part of half a million pounds on a property with a guy I’ve known for less than a year.”

And she’s right; for any other investment the conditions of buying a house are ludicrous. I am seriously looking at spending the best part of half a million pounds on a property with a guy I’ve known for less than a year in the hope that we will have (preferably a non-leaking) roof over our heads, live happily ever after together and the property will rise in value so we are able to afford somewhere bigger in five to 10 years’ time.

At the end of the debate, the audience were asked: ‘Should young people be prioritising pensions over property?’ The results came in with 32.5% choosing to focus on a pension, 46% focusing on property and 21.5% being unsure – so clearly I am not the only one aligning my priorities with property but why am I, and others of my generation, so obsessed?

Look out for ‘part two’ of Millie’s series on pensions vs property.