Hello everybody , I like to think positive , it is definitely better for the average person , I remember the back to back house in Birmingham with toilets in a block in the yard ! Not the good old days by any imagination
It has always been difficult to buy your own house , who can remember getting tax relief on there mortgage payments and life assuranc premiums ?
On another note finally recovered from Lurgy but feeling a bit done in
Glad you've recovered from the lurgy, GWRS, I expect you'll feel tired for a few days.
I suppose there was an advantage moving to France, although I didn't want to. My 4 children all had an excellent education, free University (apart from health payments and accommodation), and they all have good jobs, married French people and have been able to buy really nice houses at half the price of English houses, small deposit and low interest rates. But there are a lot of young people here who are unemployed and the unemployment rate is high, partly because of the high taxes and social charges employers have to pay.
I was lucky as a child, because my father went to Cambridge Uni when the war was over, did well, worked very hard, rose up the ladder in his field, so we lived in a lovely house in the country. Not country any more, Gatwick airport and new houses all over the fields I remember.
Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
Hello everyone. We have drizzle! Not what was forecast at all but not complaining.
Our garden day has thus become an indoor day, ripping out a unit in the pantry to make way for our dishwasher and a new sink that will be wide enough to soak oven shelves. Lots of fun. No we need to see if we can find a new base unit to fit the gap that's left.
Off to see a notaire tomorrow about wills because French inheritance law is very different from the UK - no question of leaving our "fortune" to the donkey home. Possum's college fees are about 900€ per year plus books, accommodation, feeding, clothing and insurance.
LG - not a nice surprise. I hope you manage to rescue your treasures.
Take care of yourselves, all your lurgy sufferers and recoverers.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
Hi Pat I live in Eastern Cape which is down the bottom of SA, I use to work for Volkswagen till I retired. We live about 20miles from Port Elizabeth more inland which is why we get the hot temps. today is cooler again. When I was a child our toilet was outside and a tin bath,until the landlord changed a bedroom in to a bathroom.We bought our own house and i remember the morgage rates going to 18%.We cane to SA when I was 40 and oh was45 ,i am now 75 and oh is 80 in April.
GWRS I remember getting Mortgage relief on the first house. Local rents were around £8 a month Joan and I signed mortgage papers for £13/10/0 a month then got tax relief bringing it down to £11/10/0 a month. It seemed like a millstone round the neck at first but one year later the local rents had gone up to £10 a month. Fair enough that had the rates cost in it but we had to pay rates. For the princely sum of £3,300 we got a four bedroom house that sold later for £22,000 setting us up for what I have today.
One of my Granddaughters who bought a flat with the new Government Scheme for people starting on the housing ladder with help to get the initial down payment is now stuck until the scheme runs out. She also pays some off her Student loan each month only the interest on the loan comes to more than she pays so the debt increases, madness. Of course we had it hard, hard work by both Joan and I pulled us up by the boot straps, we gave our children a good head start and they all did well having got the work ethic from Joan and I. Watching a young man being interviewed for a job on a TV programme I nearly fell off my chair when on being asked what his expectations were he said a job at £35,000 a year would start him off nicely. He is in for a shock the quick snack places are full of graduates working there because they cannot get the work they trained for. I would not like to be starting it all now, a mad mad world.
We've been to bu a base unit, as planned. Can't get on eon its own so got a simple one with two drawers then went to lookf or the plumbing bits we need. Utterly baffling and all complete units whereas we want bits to bodge with in a leak proof sort of way;
Then we looked at paint. crikey. 22€ for 1/2 litre of Dulux of 52€ for 2 litres but not in our colour so we had a pot mixed up for 62€. Good job I still have about a gallon of white paint from Homebase for mixing the paler colour!
Can't find peanuts for the birds anywhere but I've bought another nifty "donut" ring for holding 10 fat balls. Hope that does them.
Picked up a leg of lamb and a slab of belly pork for the freezer. OH spotted some fartichokes he wants me to bake as gratin. He can have them tomorrow and be propelled round the golf course on Wednesday. Monday is normally a fish day but we have last night's chicken to roast....
Bon appetit everyone.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
Hosta - I couldn't agree with you more. Every generation has had difficulties, and future ones will have them too - they'll just be different. It makes me angry when I hear people 'blaming' a particular generation - often the post war/baby boomers one, of which I'm part. I can state, hand on heart, that my parents certainly didn't have it easy. They worked their a**es off all their lives for what they had, and did without many things that people now take for granted as the norm. When I could afford to move out, interest rates were around 15% and rising. Could have done with that rate when I had savings! Swings and roundabouts - and always will be.
Weather back to normal here after getting to double figures for a little while.We even had some sun! If I'd known it was going to be dry, I'd have put washing out. It might have needed stapling onto the whirly though.....
Shame about your pots LG. I've never seen squirrels get the chicken wire off , and I wouldn't have thought foxes would be doing that either. R**dy annoying anyway
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Fairy, we were in t-shirts by lunch time, combination of hard graft and mild temperatures shattered now but lovely day!
Hosta, not surprised Amazon can build so many sweatshops....they don't ever pay tax! plus the working conditions in the fulfillment depots...yes very pretentious.....are so bad that people have had to wear incontinence pads due to lacvk of toilet breaks and camp in tents due to low wages....but yay jobs...hmmmm but enough of all that!
Frank, finding your opinion really interesting. Have tried to explain to my parents generation how our lot don't stand a chance of progress...I'm 40...work hard, low wages despite English degree, will never own a house, can't afford to save after paying bills and haven't ever had a holiday in my adult life, except four days in Norfolk for our honeymoon. Not complaining, still happy but its lovely that someone sees outside their own sphere. Thank you
Dove, took a photo of the first pussy willow for you today
Glad you had a good day Wonks. No chance of t-shirts here unless they were fleece lined
On the plus side - the crocus are opening, and a snowdrop has even started to do the same - hurrah!
I don't want my girls to be in the position of having to rent and then struggle to ever get a home of their own. I'm fortunate that I'll be able to help them - eventually, but it certainly won't be easy for them. They're fairly realistic though, which helps.
Youngest fairylet has got the bolognese on for dinner. At least they'll be able to cook a few meals, so they won't starve ...
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Posts
Hello everybody , I like to think positive , it is definitely better for the average person , I remember the back to back house in Birmingham with toilets in a block in the yard ! Not the good old days by any imagination
It has always been difficult to buy your own house , who can remember getting tax relief on there mortgage payments and life assuranc premiums ?
On another note finally recovered from Lurgy but feeling a bit done in
Have a good day everybody
Glad you've recovered from the lurgy, GWRS, I expect you'll feel tired for a few days.
I suppose there was an advantage moving to France, although I didn't want to. My 4 children all had an excellent education, free University (apart from health payments and accommodation), and they all have good jobs, married French people and have been able to buy really nice houses at half the price of English houses, small deposit and low interest rates. But there are a lot of young people here who are unemployed and the unemployment rate is high, partly because of the high taxes and social charges employers have to pay.
I was lucky as a child, because my father went to Cambridge Uni when the war was over, did well, worked very hard, rose up the ladder in his field, so we lived in a lovely house in the country. Not country any more, Gatwick airport and new houses all over the fields I remember.
Hello everyone. We have drizzle! Not what was forecast at all but not complaining.
Our garden day has thus become an indoor day, ripping out a unit in the pantry to make way for our dishwasher and a new sink that will be wide enough to soak oven shelves. Lots of fun. No we need to see if we can find a new base unit to fit the gap that's left.
Off to see a notaire tomorrow about wills because French inheritance law is very different from the UK - no question of leaving our "fortune" to the donkey home. Possum's college fees are about 900€ per year plus books, accommodation, feeding, clothing and insurance.
LG - not a nice surprise. I hope you manage to rescue your treasures.
Take care of yourselves, all your lurgy sufferers and recoverers.
Hi Pat I live in Eastern Cape which is down the bottom of SA, I use to work for Volkswagen till I retired. We live about 20miles from Port Elizabeth more inland which is why we get the hot temps. today is cooler again. When I was a child our toilet was outside and a tin bath,until the landlord changed a bedroom in to a bathroom.We bought our own house and i remember the morgage rates going to 18%.We cane to SA when I was 40 and oh was45 ,i am now 75 and oh is 80 in April.
GWRS I remember getting Mortgage relief on the first house. Local rents were around £8 a month Joan and I signed mortgage papers for £13/10/0 a month then got tax relief bringing it down to £11/10/0 a month. It seemed like a millstone round the neck at first but one year later the local rents had gone up to £10 a month. Fair enough that had the rates cost in it but we had to pay rates. For the princely sum of £3,300 we got a four bedroom house that sold later for £22,000 setting us up for what I have today.
One of my Granddaughters who bought a flat with the new Government Scheme for people starting on the housing ladder with help to get the initial down payment is now stuck until the scheme runs out. She also pays some off her Student loan each month only the interest on the loan comes to more than she pays so the debt increases, madness. Of course we had it hard, hard work by both Joan and I pulled us up by the boot straps, we gave our children a good head start and they all did well having got the work ethic from Joan and I. Watching a young man being interviewed for a job on a TV programme I nearly fell off my chair when on being asked what his expectations were he said a job at £35,000 a year would start him off nicely. He is in for a shock the quick snack places are full of graduates working there because they cannot get the work they trained for. I would not like to be starting it all now, a mad mad world.
Frank.
Hello folks - I'm back from visiting son
came back via Southwold harbour and picked up two lovely plaice fillets for supper tomorrow.
Now I'd better have a read back ...
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
We've been to bu a base unit, as planned. Can't get on eon its own so got a simple one with two drawers then went to lookf or the plumbing bits we need. Utterly baffling and all complete units whereas we want bits to bodge with in a leak proof sort of way;
Then we looked at paint. crikey. 22€ for 1/2 litre of Dulux of 52€ for 2 litres but not in our colour so we had a pot mixed up for 62€. Good job I still have about a gallon of white paint from Homebase for mixing the paler colour!
Can't find peanuts for the birds anywhere but I've bought another nifty "donut" ring for holding 10 fat balls. Hope that does them.
Picked up a leg of lamb and a slab of belly pork for the freezer. OH spotted some fartichokes he wants me to bake as gratin. He can have them tomorrow and be propelled round the golf course on Wednesday. Monday is normally a fish day but we have last night's chicken to roast....
Bon appetit everyone.
Hosta - I couldn't agree with you more. Every generation has had difficulties, and future ones will have them too - they'll just be different. It makes me angry when I hear people 'blaming' a particular generation - often the post war/baby boomers one, of which I'm part. I can state, hand on heart, that my parents certainly didn't have it easy. They worked their a**es off all their lives for what they had, and did without many things that people now take for granted as the norm. When I could afford to move out, interest rates were around 15% and rising. Could have done with that rate when I had savings! Swings and roundabouts - and always will be.
Weather back to normal here after getting to double figures for a little while.We even had some sun! If I'd known it was going to be dry, I'd have put washing out. It might have needed stapling onto the whirly though.....
Shame about your pots LG. I've never seen squirrels get the chicken wire off , and I wouldn't have thought foxes would be doing that either. R**dy annoying anyway
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Fairy, we were in t-shirts by lunch time, combination of hard graft and mild temperatures
shattered now but lovely day!
Hosta, not surprised Amazon can build so many sweatshops....they don't ever pay tax!
plus the working conditions in the fulfillment depots...yes very pretentious.....are so bad that people have had to wear incontinence pads due to lacvk of toilet breaks and camp in tents due to low wages....but yay jobs...hmmmm 
but enough of all that! 
Frank, finding your opinion really interesting. Have tried to explain to my parents generation how our lot don't stand a chance of progress...I'm 40...work hard, low wages despite English degree, will never own a house, can't afford to save after paying bills and haven't ever had a holiday in my adult life, except four days in Norfolk for our honeymoon. Not complaining, still happy but its lovely that someone sees outside their own sphere. Thank you
Dove, took a photo of the first pussy willow for you today
Glad you had a good day Wonks. No chance of t-shirts here unless they were fleece lined
On the plus side - the crocus are opening, and a snowdrop has even started to do the same - hurrah!
I don't want my girls to be in the position of having to rent and then struggle to ever get a home of their own. I'm fortunate that I'll be able to help them - eventually, but it certainly won't be easy for them. They're fairly realistic though, which helps.
Youngest fairylet has got the bolognese on for dinner. At least they'll be able to cook a few meals, so they won't starve ...
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...