Property ladder myth
In early summer, Stuart told me he would purchase a flat. He had been talking about it before, but I didn’t realize he was that serious. I shuddered—the housing market would crash.
The year was 2006, a couple of years away from the financial crisis triggered by the defaulted debts in the subprime loans market. It’s not that I had the intelligence to predict the future of the world economy or was psychic, but it was the distrust for the housing market. I had seen through the ’80s and ’90s when the Japanese economy soared, then plunged, and people were left with a house half the purchased value and the debt. The British economy and the housing market were booming like the ’80s Japan. And due to inflation, the interest rate was over 4%. So it didn’t sound like a good idea that a man with a modest income would buy a property now.
I conveyed to Stuart the anxiety I had about the topic in general, but he ensured that the sooner you got on the property ladder, the better. Besides, he was losing money by paying rent (which was 1/3 of what the mortgage would be.) He was very excited about the idea of owning a property, and who wouldn’t be? It was proof of one’s success. Or was it an illusion that made one FEEL successful?