The financial struggle facing millennials is laid bare in a series of stats that shows just how much harder it has been for them to get on the housing ladder.
Data cards offering a snapshot of the economy in each of the last five decades show how the decade between 1995 and 2005 saw house prices drift out of reach.
In 1995, the average house cost £51,084 which was almost four times the average salary of £13,302. In the decade to 2005, pay packets rose 52% (to an average £20,215) while house prices soared by an eye-watering 199% to £152,790. That’s 7.5 times the average annual salary.
The position in 1995 was healthier than 1985 (when houses were near five times the average salary) or 1975 (when they cost six times).
It all shows that the Britain of Britpop was much more affordable than the Britain of, well, James Blunt. You can come to your own conclusions about the quality of the music.
Perhaps the only ray of light comes in terms of interest rates – with this falling from 6.62% in 1995 to 4.5% in 2005 and 0.5% in 2015. That at least has a knock-on effect when it comes to punching some numbers into a loan calculator and seeing how much it will cost to borrow for a big purchase.
