h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Ownership does impose a sense of pride and I suppose a responsibilty to your neighbours. My next door neighbour had to move into an old peoples home as, despite help from us, he wasn't coping. We're talking about a very proud, retired bank manager, enthusiatic church goer and keen gardener. His children have let his grand daughter and her boy friend move in.

They're not bad people by any measure but, as they have no stake in the property, they don't see the point in maintaining the house and garden. Being a lot younger than the rest of us they have a different attitude to small, maybe even petty, things like where cars are parked so that everybody else can park. The fabric of the house is deteriorating and the garden has gone to rack and ruin.

Maybe the most telling example was seeing his old dining table, nurtured and polished over many years, and witness no doubt to many happy family meals, probably before the present occupants were born, tossed out onto the front lawn to rot in the winter weather. Says it all really

I think we do forget the different time available & priorities, as well as the attitude of today's young people.

Someone who's cherished their garden & house for years, spent time on it in retirement & knows all it's quirks will have been brought up in an age of 'making things last'.

A young couple, (both working?) probably don't have the same time/inclination and only know the diposable culture.

Although with all these house & garden makeover programmes, don't they say DIY is enjoying a revival? The problem with those programmes is that they seem to offer a quick-fix solution & neglect to emphasise the value of time spent in preparation beforehand & maintenance afterwards.

There is also an - easy come easy go - couldn't care less attitude that verges, I think, on selfishness. Maybe it's my seagoing background and an ability to take care of myself, my loved ones and my environment that causes the anguish. The young (25?) lad can't seeemingly cope with simple tasks such as cutting the grass or fixing the garge door; it's left to swing in the wind until eventually it will drop off it's hinges.

Even my young dogs, at 6 months, keep their kennel and run clean and tidy. Animals don't foul their own nests.

It puzzles me why given an opportunity to live in a lovely house, probably rent free, they can't be arsed to keep it in good nick for the eventual sale when the old boy goes to meet his maker. Maybe it's the attitude of the parents who are too dim to realise that the value of their inheritance is being eroded by the neglect of their children.

Afternoon WA,

Did we sit in the same class at school, or grow up in the same time perhaps?

Novo

Hi Novo,

Maybe just senior members of the Grumpy Old Gits club. At least we stil do give a ****.

WA

It's not just the young that don't appreciate their gardens. my next door neighbour's is appalling (although the cats quite like it in the summer when then can pounce on each other in the long grass) The bottom corner of my garden was over run with bindweed last year. I hope I've got all because I want to make it into a fruit patch this year - he has logs from a tree felling which apparently happened three years ago and the fence between us was a disgrace (we replaced that last year). Even the front of the house looks awful (those horrid vertical blinds that are more suitable for offices - covered in dust and stained to buggery).

I rent my house from the local council - he owns his. Go figure

Some folk on here assume that I started the GOGC !, But you're right WA, we DO give a s**t.

Novo

Atleast we give a shit!

Does this imply that there are others that dont, is it, people who werent in your class, or people who are younger than you.

when I worked for the housing department as a janitor on blocks of flats that were all rented I found there was a correlation between age and the way the flats and landings were treated dependant on age, but it was far from being a hard and fast rule. Im not going to go into a long post about it though i could if people wanted me too but the main differences were a separation in views about communal areas.

Older tenants took more pride in their space while younger did takenoticeably less action to keep things nice. Younger residents respected communal areas as just that while older residents thought nothing of and fought damned hard to retain all manor of blockages and fire hazards not just in communal areas but we often found them sneaking gas bottles which are a danger to all into their flats..

Owern ship doesnt dictate pride my grandparents rented all thier lives and always took care of what essentially was the councils house but "our home". Attitudes to material items has changed over time. When I previously worked for the refuse department I saw the way people disposed of things that could easily be fixed.

and in the meantime due to lack of social housing people who can't afford to buy are paying more than a mortgage in rent...

Interesting thread.

I live in a road composed of Victorian terraced houses. We call the other side of the street the 'posh side', as most are owner occupied. My side is the unposh side, we are mostly housing association or council owned, and we pay rent. Yes one or two on my side do look pretty shabby, but by no means all. The other side of the street are continually fiddling with their properties, cladding, repainting, replanting the garden etc, presumably to increase their saleable value.

My flat is owned by a housing association, I rent the downstairs section. I like to think I look after it in a basic way, but I certainly don't endlesssly fiddle with the decor and kitchen and bathroom, to keep up its saleable value. I could buy it outright but choose not to. Any spare cash I happen to have goes in the building society or occassionally stocks and shares. I just don't get this concept of owning your home being an investment. It's your home for goodness sakes. Apparently my attitude is also fairly common in continental Europe. But I'm not doing it for any ideological reasons, it just makes sense to me for my lifestyle. Oh and btw I'm doing okay you with my investements, so don't say, 'oh its because you don't have a family'. My brother has kids, and I don't think they'll be complaing.

Fanny, re the investment thing. You'll probably see the house value rise more than your investments will. It also means that, if you move house, you can sell the one you're living in now. Would a mortgage be significantly more than your rent?

But that's the point pedro. I love my home as my home. I would hate to leave this place, it would really upset me. So I don't want to associate it with anything to do with making money. Don't worry though I'm doing fine with investements. Fine for any normal human being to live a comfortable life. I don't want to be a ing millionaire. And it means that if anything serious or unexpected happens to my home, the housing association will pay for it. I like having that feeling of security.

Yup, Fanny, I agree. If my boiler fails some buggar will come out and fix it for me (or replace it) at no cost to me

I, sometimes, wonder whether owner occupiers are jealous of us (I would say that 60% of the houses here are, now, privately owned)

I've just had brand spanking new windows (double glazed) and a brand spanking new front and back door. (might buy mine in a couple of years)

Hmm, when I was renting the chances of getting nice new windows, or stuff fixed quickly, or just the place to look less shabby was fairly remote as the landlords were not interested in spending much money to keep the place nice for tenants. I think it is very unfair to blame renters for the state of some rental places when it is often down to the landlord.

I'd rather not rent so I can live somewhere where I don't have to get permission in writing to give a grotty room a coat of paint, or to be able to bang in a nail to hang a picture. When I bought my first place the mortgage was about the same as I was paying in rent for a room in a shared house so it made sense to me to spend that money and get my own place - that probably isn't the case any more.

We don't see owning our home as an investment, rather it represents stability and freedom to live how we like. No danger of being given notice to quit, and I could dig up part of the back garden to make a vegetable patch without having to get permission. We can have pets. If it makes money over the years we are here, then all well and good but money in property never strikes me as 'real' money anyhow because you can only get hold of it if you sell up and downsize.

I can do all of that fatkelli in my housing association flat. That's the difference between private landlords and HAs. HAs care about providing decent places for people to *live* in, where as private landlords just want to make money.

Nowadays there are more and more people who own 2, 3, 4, 5, or more houses and let them to students or newly weds - its the new nest-egg, buy a run down house that some pensioner has lived in for 60 years, tart it up, and let it.

No wonder house prices are through the roof - I can see no reason why anyone should be allowed to buy more than 1 house each. Unless of course they are a property dealer, in which case its their business, not a side-line.

The latest dodge is to talk about reducing planning laws, to allow people to individualise their properties, but read a little deeper, and what it really menas is doing away with green-belt legislation so more houses can be built on green-field sites. There are acres of development sites in cities - mainly closed down factories, but they're all bought up by companies like T*sc* who then use it to hold councils to ransom when they want to build another supermarket.

PS Kelli - don't bang in a nail to hang a picture - use a screw and fitting - you'll thank me when you come decorate.

Well in the case of students, we're generally not really interested in settling down and buying a house, so a supply of rental accomodation is necessary, and someone has to own them.

On the other hand, the way that prices get ridiculous as you get closer to university (I lived in a converted boiler room last year), and the fact that some people are making absolute shedloads of money out of this whilst barely doing any work does chafe a bit.

But then wealth begets more wealth is the way its always been.

This was quite interesting about house prices in the Grauniad today.

http://business.guardian.co.uk/economicdispatch/story/0,,2016376,00.html