The Snobbery Thread

[19QOS19]

Surely, all being well, they will be on their own 2 feet by the time you snuff it and there's not much point leaving it for your grandkids as their life will be dominated by the world burning up.
My advice would be sell and keep enough to in rent to see you through your final years and spend the rest of the cash doing what you want.

Hopefully but it's still something for them. Providing all goes well and I'm fortunate to still be in the job I'm in I'll be mortgage free when I'm 50 so the mortgage money will be getting spent on nicer holidays etc. They can have the house, my 'savings' will be spent on myself.

I fully expect to pay the mortgage off or retire and be hit by a bus or something a few weeks later mind you.

[Satoshi]

4 hours ago, KingRocketman II said:

Yet you are the opposite end of the snobbery spectrum. A redundant comment after IKEA solely for our benefit and possibly just to show how above all that grubby common materialism you truly are. 

How do you know if someone doesn't have a TV? They tell you within 5 mins of meeting them*

 

(*admittedly having a TV now is a little less of a dramatic statement given the number of people who stream through laptop etc)

Yeah that's fair, I didn't want to portray something from Ikea as being something speical but probably wasn't necessary. I haven't lived in the UK for a while so I actually don't know any other furniture shops (is DFS still about?)

I also have a TV (but as you say I really just use through a laptop with a HDMI).

I think the comparison with England is interesting, it's definitely different in Scotland. There are no JRM or Boris Johnson type politicians here - and you can't imagine it any time soon. The English seem far more deferential to their 'betters' whereas in Scotland being from an aristocrat background would surely only harm you politically. I've always thought if Scotland had a king he would take the bus (like the king of Norway).

I'd say you can't really claim to be be against snobbery and pro royal family.

Edited October 12, 2021 by Satoshi

[ICTChris]

I was out for a walk in a nice little town at the weekend, in a nice enough area.  One of the houses had a flagpole with "Rangers League Champions" flag flying on it, previously it's had a Union flag flying.  The garden and driveway are littered with semi-dismantled cars and other assorted junk.  Would I be being snobby if I said I was glad I didn't live near that house?  

It did make me think though - my parents live in a very nice street with lots of big old houses on it.  The house next door is the oldest on the street and has a huge garden.  The owner doesn't keep it up well and it has caravans parked up, piles of various crap he's accumulated.  When his daughters were young he bought them Shetland ponies and they would roam about eating the grass.  He is an outdoor, hunting/shooting type, and turned an old air raid shelter into a pen for half a dozen English pointers.  It's not very sightly and some of the neighbours have made noises about complaining but he's a decent guy, he doesn't cause any bother.  I had a girlfriend stay over once and she opened the curtains to see him over the wall sawing the head off a deer he'd bagged, which was amusing.

I don't think the same way about him than I do about the ex-council house with a Rangers flag and dismantled van over it.  Obviously I kind of know the guy next to my parents but maybe I am prejudiced about it.

[19QOS19]

I wouldn't want to stay next to anyone who owns a flagpole, regardless of what they have flying at the top.

[Honest_Man#1]

19 minutes ago, 19QOS19 said:

I wouldn't want to stay next to anyone who owns a flagpole, regardless of what they have flying at the top.

Flagshaggers of all varieties are complete weirdos.

[Ross.]

2 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

It's just ludicrous in a lot of places where mortgage payments are a significantly lower than rents.

The big issue for many though is they can't get a mortgage in the first place or the mortgage they are offered is not big enough for the house they want - hence we've seen the growth in 35 year mortgages - that really is mental.

35 year mortgage is probably appropriate in most cases. If you buy when you are under 40 you’ll be paying it off as you retire, which in the UK is still why most folk buy.

Theres a wealth tax here, which varies from canton to canton, but essentially it means no one ever wants to pay off their mortgage at any point, as it then becomes an asset owned by you and you pay tax on the value. I think where I am it’s 1% per year on the value above 100k.

[tamthebam]

1 hour ago, Satoshi said:

Yeah that's fair, I didn't want to portray something from Ikea as being something speical but probably wasn't necessary. I haven't lived in the UK for a while so I actually don't know any other furniture shops (is DFS still about?)

I also have a TV (but as you say I really just use through a laptop with a HDMI).

I think the comparison with England is interesting, it's definitely different in Scotland. There are no JRM or Boris Johnson type politicians here - and you can't imagine it any time soon. The English seem far more deferential to their 'betters' whereas in Scotland being from an aristocrat background would surely only harm you politically. I've always thought if Scotland had a king he would take the bus (like the king of Norway).

I'd say you can't really claim to be be against snobbery and pro royal family.

If we made Andy Cameron king he could drive the bus. 

[DeeTillEhDeh]

35 year mortgage is probably appropriate in most cases. If you buy when you are under 40 you’ll be paying it off as you retire, which in the UK is still why most folk buy.
Theres a wealth tax here, which varies from canton to canton, but essentially it means no one ever wants to pay off their mortgage at any point, as it then becomes an asset owned by you and you pay tax on the value. I think where I am it’s 1% per year on the value above 100k.

With retirement at age 67/68 then you are looking at well under 40 for an initial 35 year mortgage - 32/33. If you are any older then you'd be looking to have a shorter mortgage when you remortgage.

I was late to the house-buying market so had a 25 year mortgage when I was 38 - now repaid in just over 16 years as we shortened it with each remortgage.

I was more making the point of people lumbering themselves with 35 year mortgages to buy a 4/5 bedroom house that they possibly don't need.

[Ross.]

57 minutes ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

With retirement at age 67/68 then you are looking at well under 40 for an initial 35 year mortgage - 32/33. If you are any older then you'd be looking to have a shorter mortgage when you remortgage.

I was late to the house-buying market so had a 25 year mortgage when I was 38 - now repaid in just over 16 years as we shortened it with each remortgage.

I was more making the point of people lumbering themselves with 35 year mortgages to buy a 4/5 bedroom house that they possibly don't need.

Sadly, I feel you are being more than ambitious to suggest that anyone around the age of 40 or under will be retiring at 67. I’ll be surprised if the pension age isn’t 5 years older at least by the time I get to that point, and I’m a few months short of turning 40.

[Billy Jean King]

Sadly, I feel you are being more than ambitious to suggest that anyone around the age of 40 or under will be retiring at 67. I’ll be surprised if the pension age isn’t 5 years older at least by the time I get to that point, and I’m a few months short of turning 40.

Anyone basing "retirement age" on when they will be getting their state pension needs a major rethink and quickly. I had it pointed out to me a long time ago that if you were working, the state pension should be looked upon as a bonus, a "top up" if you like to private provision. I've been working on that proviso for decades and hope to retire certainly in the next 5 years maybe even sooner and that's a good 8-10 years shy of "the pension". Even that close I'm far from certain the state pension will be anything like it is now and I fully expect at least 1 further push back on the state retiral age. If under 40 I would simply forget you are going to get a state pension and concentrate on making personal provision.

[Boghead ranter]

4 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

The big issue for many though is they can't get a mortgage in the first place or the mortgage they are offered is not big enough for the house they want - hence we've seen the growth in 35 year mortgages - that really is mental.

My 1st job was in a building society, from '85 to '93 or so, and I can well remember selling 35/40 year mortgages to 1st time buyers in the late 80s (when the mortgage rate varied between 13 and 15% ).

Crazy to think that, if any of those people have never moved (unlikely I know), they will only be getting towards paying those mortgages off now.

[19QOS19]

Anyone basing "retirement age" on when they will be getting their state pension needs a major rethink and quickly. I had it pointed out to me a long time ago that if you were working, the state pension should be looked upon as a bonus, a "top up" if you like to private provision. I've been working on that proviso for decades and hope to retire certainly in the next 5 years maybe even sooner and that's a good 8-10 years shy of "the pension". Even that close I'm far from certain the state pension will be anything like it is now and I fully expect at least 1 further push back on the state retiral age. If under 40 I would simply forget you are going to get a state pension and concentrate on making personal provision.

My thinking as well. I'm not even expecting to receive a state pension tbh. I imagine it'll be into the 70's by the time it comes to me. I'll probably be dead by then.

[Venti]

39 minutes ago, 19QOS19 said:

My thinking as well. I'm not even expecting to receive a state pension tbh. I imagine it'll be into the 70's by the time it comes to me. I'll probably be dead by then.

RIP 

[sparky88]

5 hours ago, 19QOS19 said:

I wouldn't want to stay next to anyone who owns a flagpole, regardless of what they have flying at the top.

Snobbery Thread for this pish

[Derry Alli]

6 hours ago, 19QOS19 said:

I fully expect to pay the mortgage off or retire and be hit by a bus or something a few weeks later mind you.

I greenies this because it made me laugh, not because I wish to see it happen - I just feel I need to explain that.

Do you plan on an early retirement? 

[19QOS19]

I greenies this because it made me laugh, not because I wish to see it happen - I just feel I need to explain that. [emoji38]
Do you plan on an early retirement? 

All going well and I don't make an arse of it/redundancy then I'm planning on having put enough away to retire about 60. I don't think that's early really but I bet it will seem early when the state retirement age is around 79 by then.

[Shandon Par]

On 11/10/2021 at 13:58, ICTChris said:

Having a mortgage and a leased car are perfectly normal things.  They must be as I have both.

I think that the conspicious consumption thing drives a lot of snobbery, from the blunt sort of "people on benefits with flat screen TVs" to more subtle views of social markers, tastelessness etc.

I am lucky enough to be in a reasonably well paid job but I do find some of the stuff colleagues spend their money on to be completely insane.  One of my colleagues has six TVs in his house (living room, kitchen, his room, two kids rooms and bathroom).  Am I being a snob when I think that's over the top?  

That’s definitely some Edinburgh middle class-ness rubbing off on you. Sneering at people for having a fancy tv or car yet thinking nothing of spending a fortune on pots and pans or your holiday home on the East Neuk.

[Zen Archer (Raconteur)]

I recall simpler times when a snob was someone who got out of the bath to go to the toilet.

[welshbairn]

2 minutes ago, Zen Archer (Raconteur) said:

I recall simpler times when a snob was someone who got out of the bath to go to the toilet.

Or took the dishes out of the sink before having a pish.

[Shandon Par]

Accents are such an immediate potential “trigger” for snobbery too. 

I’ve always liked nice cars but I’m a saddo car geek and have never been interested in them in terms of being a status symbol (and as a car geek it’s easy to spot those who have bought a car as a trophy).