‘It’s hard not to feel like a failure’: Meet the Homeagainers ‘the cost of living kids’ forced to move back in with mum and dad

Leaving home and making your own way was once a given, but those aged between 18 and 29 and still living with their parents is now at its highest since the 1940s. Olivia Petter catches up with three women ‘priced out of their own lives’ to discover how it feels to miss out on the grown-up milestones that other generations took for granted

‘I feel like I don’t have a private life because my parents know what I’m doing from when I wake to when I go to sleep,’ says Milly, who has been unable to move out of her parent’s home due to financial reasons (iStock)

Ellie* was reticent at first. A 31-year-old, successful entrepreneur who’d built a business from the ground up, she was hardly looking forward to the prospect of returning home to live with mum and dad. “My landlord put the rent up by £300 a month and it just didn’t seem worth staying for a shared house,” she recalls.

So, she packed up and moved to the other side of London; back into the room she grew up in. “I feel pretty trapped,” she says, noting how her parents are constantly around, surveilling her every move like when she was a teenager. “My world just suddenly seems very small. The only other time I felt like that was when I last lived here at 23 and I escaped that by leaving the country. Maybe that’s what I need to do this time.”

The trouble is, Ellie can’t afford to leave the country. She can barely afford to leave her parents’ house or maintain the co-working space she rents out because even that has upped its monthly price by 10 per cent. Essentially, like many other single, city-dwelling millennials, Ellie is slowly being priced out of her life. And it’s not clear when, or if, she’ll be able to buy her way back in.

Introducing “the homeagainers”: a generation of twenty and thirtysomethings who are being forced to give up a life of freedom and flatshares and move back home to save money. According to a 2023 survey from Harris Poll for Bloomberg, roughly 45 per cent of people aged 18 to 29 are living at home with their families, marking the highest figure since the 1940s. Meanwhile, more than 60 per cent of Gen-Zers and millennials reported moving back home over the previous two years, with the primary reason being financial challenges.

Moving back home as an adult to save money is hardly a new phenomenon. In the wake of a big breakup, which is also common in your twenties or thirties, it’s practically a rite of passage. But the recent stats indicate a significant spike in the number of people retreating to mum and dad. It’s no coincidence that the increase comes amid the cost of living crisis, which has been slowly worsening since 2021.

Energy bills are higher than ever before, as are rental prices. Thanks to inflation, everything from our petrol pumps to our supermarket shops have been getting incrementally more expensive. And don’t get us started on mortgage rates. At times, it can feel like a miracle to make your rent by the end of the month. So, if moving back home is an option for you, and you can enjoy a rent-free life for a while, why wouldn’t you take it up? Plus, when you consider how much you’re saving, it’s not all that bad.

I constantly feel this sense of owing something to my parents. It doesn’t feel like my home

Ella*

“There’s always food in the fridge and someone ready to prepare a meal for you,” says Milly*, 27, who originally moved back home during the pandemic and, due to financial reasons, has been unable to leave since. “Sometimes, mum does my laundry, too, which is obviously a huge plus.”

Fran*, 32, moved back in with her mum last December. But the reason is a little more positive: “I’m saving up to buy,” she explains. “It’s actually been really nice to live with my mum as a woman and seeing how she lives. She is also starting to understand my job a bit more, seeing my Zoom meetings in the kitchen and stuff. It’s nice that she gets to see what I do; I’m not sure she ever really got it before.” Fran has saved £1,600 each month since moving home, all of which is going towards a deposit she’ll use to buy her first home. Of course, there have been compromises. “My commute has tripled, and my mum now has to collect me from the station whenever I come home, so that’s been interesting,” she adds. “It’s tough but I know it will be worth it when I eventually do leave and move into my own place.”

In some instances, though, things aren’t quite as rosy, particularly if there’s no clear endpoint to the return-to-home period. “I might try and sublet somewhere for a few months but beyond that, I can’t really see when I’ll be able to afford to leave,” says Milly, whose life has, in some ways, been put on pause since she moved home. “I feel like I don’t have a private life because my parents know what I’m doing from when I wake to when I go to sleep.”

It’s no coincidence that, for the last 18 months, Milly didn’t go on a single date. “I’ve just started dating people again but I’m trying to keep it a secret from my parents so I have something that’s still mine. Although I suppose that will change if I want to go home with one of them.”

On a psychological level, moving back home is complex and can leave us regressing in deeper ways, too. “Being in that environment may reactivate our ‘inner child’, leading us to exhibit childish behaviours if we feel insecure or vulnerable,” explains counsellor Georgina Sturmer. “For some of us, it’s just about reminding ourselves to retain an adult mindset. For others, it might require us to pay more attention to our inner child and think about the unhelpful strategies that we developed when we were young, and our needs weren’t being met.”

One universal feeling among adults moving back home is one of failure, and not just economically. “I feel like I’m not where I wanted to be at this point in my life,” says Ella*, 28, who moved back home with her sisters and boyfriend after her landlord upped the rent and she switched jobs. “When I compare my situation to my friends, who are renting their own flats, it’s hard not to feel like a failure. It’s a major knock to your self-confidence.”

‘It’s a major knock to your self confidence’, says Ella who has to move out after her landlord upped her rent (iStock)

There is also, obviously, a lack of autonomy. “I don’t feel like I can do what I want to do when I want to do it,” adds Ella. “I can’t come home and make what I want for dinner or watch what I want on TV because it’s not my house. And because I’m living there, I constantly feel this sense of owing something to my parents. It doesn’t feel like my home.”

Milly agrees. “I just always have to answer to someone,” she says. “It has had a huge impact in terms of how I feel in my career because you’re always told to measure success by your ability to afford a place of your own, whether that’s renting or buying.” The plan was always to move out quickly and start renting, but as time has gone on, and the rental market has become increasingly expensive and competitive, that’s become a less realistic prospect. “In London, it’s just not easy, particularly if you’re freelancing like me. It makes me feel unsuccessful.”

These feelings are compounded if the circumstances bringing you back home are that you’ve just gone through a major break-up, a situation that has always been pretty dismal but surely more so when it happens in such a precarious economy. A recent survey from British real estate company Zoopla found that a third of the 500 respondents who purchased a home with a partner and then broke up continued to cohabit.

‘You just feel like 10 years have passed and you’ve got nowhere,’ says Alice (pictured) (Irene Chirita)

“I broke up with my boyfriend in July 2023 and, after attempting to ‘share the space’ – I would live there for a week, he would live there for a week – I was so emotionally/physically exhausted by it I just decided I would move back to my mum’s until I got it sorted,” says Alice, 32. Mum’s is a three-hour train ride away from where Alice and her ex had been living.

“After having my own place and my own routine, moving back felt like a huge failure,” she continues. “It was hard to feel like myself. I was also in the same room that I was living in before I moved away to university and something about that is hard to escape, like you just feel like 10 years have passed and you’ve got nowhere.” Alice has since managed to move back into a flatshare. “I feel really lucky to have had my family’s support but also grateful we can enjoy a bit of space now.”

For some, the regression can be incredibly motivating. “It’s made me much more disciplined,” says Ellie. “It takes me so much longer to get anywhere now so I’m far more discerning about where I go in the evenings. I also have to get up earlier to get to the gym on time, so I find myself staying in a lot more. It has also just made me really focused on work and trying to find a way to be able to afford to leave.”

If all goes to plan, that departure could well take Ellie overseas. “All this has just made me pretty set on wanting to leave the country,” she says. “I know the second I don’t have to be at home anymore I want to feel free, and that probably means getting as far away as I possibly can.”

*Names have been changed