Life: Peter Pan Is Coming Home

ITM’s Canadian correspondent finds out more about the “living at home with the folks” phenomenon that is sweeping across the globe.

“Just for a few weeks. Until I get settled,” Carissa tells her parents just before moving back home. A few weeks later, she hasn’t quite gotten settled yet.

Carissa is not alone, as she is one of countless numbers of young adults, or “adultescents”, living at home with their parents. And, surprising as it may seem to some, these are socially stable, educated and employed contributors to Australia’s economy, like 33 year old Carissa, who is employed full-time, and has an undergraduate and a graduate degree. Some have never left home, like Peter, a 23 year old electrical engineer. Like most adultescents, Peter’s main motivation for staying at home? “Money. That, and I’m waiting until I am married, or at least engaged until I move out.”

Then there are those who have flown back to the safe havens of the empty nest, composing a quarter of these “kidults”. Once an anomaly, the number of adultescent boomerang children has increased steadily, and it’s part of a global pattern, not just unique in Australia. According to Statistics Canada, those born between 1972 and 1976 were three times more likely to return home than their baby boomers parents were, with 32% of men and 28% of women coming back.

The safety and security of home is something that children return to when something substantial in their lives has finished. The pursuit of higher education is heavily stressed upon these days, and a quarter of adults living at home are back after completing school. Escalating education costs have left graduating students with a massive debtload, so, like Peter, another quarter are back home to start saving those quarters.

Soaring house prices are yet another variable in the financial equation. In the past three years, the Australian housing price index has vaulted just over 20%, even with a 7% drop in the past two years within the heavily populated Sydney region where Peter lives .

The other prerequisite of saving money is being able to earn money. Another 12% of boomerang kids come back after their jobs or contracts end, such as Carissa, who returned after working overseas for seven months to work another short-term job, something very common with a Generation X/Y worker who is apt to change jobs within their career about as often as Kylie changes costumes during a concert.

There are also the 10% who come back to tend to a broken heart such as Sadbh, a 20 year old student from Sydney who moved back in with her parents after breaking up with her boyfriend. But rather than move in with other friends, “I just wanted to go home,” she explains.

Chris, a 31 year old from Melbourne, came home after breaking up with his fiancée. However, rather than move into the house where they were supposed to share their matrimonial bliss, Chris moved back in with his parents, and rented the house out as an investment. He’s even looking at buying another property. And his parents? “They’re still cool with me being here – my younger brothers still live at home too,” Chris explains.

On the relationship front, Australians have also been delaying marriage. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the average age for a man to tie the knot is 29 years, and 28 for a woman, up from 27 and 25 a decade ago. While common-law relationships have increased (76% of couples lived together before marriage compared to 16% just under 30 years ago), a common-law relationship is also more likely to dissolve than a marriage, which could factor into the increased incidence of boomerang adults.

There is also a cultural factor at play. Australia has a high migrant population, which has steadily increased since John Howard took power and introduced policies such as the Skilled Migration Program. Similarly, in Canada, parents born in Asia or Central America were more likely to live with an adult child, and recent immigrants, such as Asian born parents who arrived in Canada between 1980 and 2001 were 82% likely to have an adult child living at home. Sadbh’s Irish-born parents echo these trends, having arrived in Australia in 1988, and Peter’s parents emigrated from Lebanon when they were six years old.

What does all of this mean? Despite the emphasis on saving money, adultescents also tend to spend more on travel and luxury items, such as electronic gadgets, as they have more disposable income. With more people pursuing higher education (and incurring heavy student loan debt), career changes, increased immigration, and common-law relationships, its also likely living at home will be more commonplace than before.

Furthermore, with aging population, rising healthcare costs, and seniors’ preference towards independent living over assisted living communities, it’s entirely plausible that the next major trend will be, wait for it, parents moving into their children’s homes.

Like any living arrangement, a lot depends upon the relationship between parent and child. “I’d like to think they always enjoy my company, even though my belongings are now taking up 2.5 bedrooms and some of the living space,” confesses Carissa. “Plus,” she continues, “I still hog the remote”.

Fights for remotes aside, the tendency to welcome adult children back with open arms is one more often witnessed with parents who stayed at home longer, giving credence to the adage that “you’re a product of your environment”. For example, Carissa’s parents did not move out of their homes until their mid-20’s.

When Adam Horovitz shouted out “Living at home is such a drag!” back in 1986, there were just over 650,000 Australian adults living with their parents. Now, there are over one and a half million. But, as living at home becomes more commonplace in the realities of today’s world, contrary to Will Smith back in the day, maybe now parents just do understand.

Vincent Chew is an adultescent 31 year old who recently moved back home into his parents’ home after working overseas.

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