Do you wonder how you will have a house and a family? Do you see how different life is for you when you think of your parent's life for whom a home and a family seemed a normal expectation?
If you cannot see a home and a family in your future, you are not alone.
The BBC report today that 1.6 million adults (20-40) are living with their parents because they cannot afford to have a home of their own.
Of this group, nearly 60% report that the relationship with their parents has deteriorated as a result. Of course this was not the plan for either the kids or the parents.
Many complain abut high home prices but what about low earnings and high student debt?
- If you have high student debt, a mortgage is out of the question
- If you can only get a minimum wage job, then you will not have the income or the savings to buy a home.
If you have played by the old rules, the old normal of home owning is off the table. So what then about living with your parents?
- If you think it is normal to live only an independent life - you and your partner and only your young kids - then living in an extended family will feel bad
The new reality is that few of us can now afford to be as separate and independent as we thought was normal and expected.
I see that much of the stress connected to this sense of failure comes from expectations that are rooted in the old paradigm of Separation that is tied to the idea of a Job.
But if you shift your mindset, then this can open up a lot of opportunity instead of a feeling of failure.
What if you aspired to a Tiny House with all the tiny costs associated with them? Many are starting to think this way. This is a reason why I see that the Tiny House Movement is taking off in America. Tiny houses make all aspects of home ownership more affordable by design. It's not just that they cost less but they drive a different lifestyle that drives down your fixed costs in the future and makes you more free.
You can explore this more here if you want.
In a Tiny House you can also have a low cost base that will enable you to start a business of your own and so become part of the new networked world.
A group of Tiny Houses are a local network where you can share resources with other families rather than having the costs of having everything for your self.
And what about living with your parents? If this is an accident then it may be awful. But what if this was intentional? What if you designed the place to work well? What if you and your parents saw the value?
I write this with 2 grandkids staying with us. We have set up our life now to make this our new normal. We live near the other Granny too and near lots of cousins.
Is not the Extended Family the REAL TRADITIONAL FAMILY? The Tribe is the social and economic structure that works. It is not simply co housing but economic. It works for ALL parties.
You don't need child care costs. I don't need a pension. You have less dysfunction as there are more models. You don't need to commute. You can get time back. As an intention, the Tribe works well.
If you don't have a lot of relatives, what about your close friends? After all as we get older, do you really think we are all going to be in old people's homes?
Is not the barrier in our minds as we hang onto the old paradigm?
Want to know more?
An introduction to this is in my first book - You Don't need a Job - in the spring of 2013, I will publish a book on the Home and the Family where these ideas and the many examples that exist now will be explored more deeply.
