MY RADICAL SOLUTION TO LOCAL HOUSING CRISIS? I’M BACK HOME LIVING WITH MY PARENTS

It’s thought that unless radical steps are taken to address the UK housing shortage more than half of young adults will end up living with their mum and dad. Kerry McKittrick talks to three people who are back in the family abode and why they have chosen

‘They’re a huge support and help me so much with Libby’

Kerri Quinn (34) is an actress and lives in Belfast with her daughter Libby (5). She says:

My daughter Libby and I have been living with my parents for over two years. It all came about because there was a sectarian hate crime on the house I lived in with my partner. We didn’t feel safe in the house anymore so we moved in with mum and dad. That put a lot of pressure on the relationship so my partner and I split up.

I’m still planning on what to do next.

I get on very well with my parents so I don’t feel that there’s pressure to move out. They’ve been a huge support and help me so much with Libby — I don’t think I would be able to work without them.

They’re the glue that holds the family together.

There are times that you want to come home, watch a DVD in your jammies and eat a lot of junk, but then my mum will be in cleaning mode. I have to acknowledge the fact that it’s her home.

Mind you, I do love things to be clean but my mum is a fanatic. She takes it to another level.

I try to be supportive to them too. They come home from nine to five jobs every day and I try to have the dinner on, a couple of washes done and the shopping in if I can.

I want to help take the pressure of day to day chores off them too.

I can’t really have people back to the house or have a dinner party just because it’s not my house to invite people to. It’s not my home.

It’s never been a permanent thing — it was always just until we sold our old house.

Renting would cripple us so we’re still working on it.

I would love to be down the line where I can get me and Libby a new start in a new home,

but that might take a while. I’m in no hurry because I love living with my parents. There is no mad panic to settle down and people tend to have kids later in life so I think we do tend to linger with our parents now.

It’s very normal to have a broken relationship so I know a lot of people who have kids and live with their parents so they can work and not have to worry about childcare.”

I’d love a new start in a new home for me and my daughter, but it might take a while

Home birds: Gabriel Thomson, Zoe Wanamaker, Robert Lindsay and Daniela Denby-Ashe star in My Family, a comedy that follows the lives of a family with older children

On stage: Kerri Quinn in Educating Rita and (above left) at the Mac