Surprise! Your grown-up kids are back!

When your children leave home, you don’t expect them to return! But that’s what a whole ‘boomerang generation’ is doing. Here’s how to live in harmony

Sound familiar? Here’s how to navigate a crowded house

Once, it was straightforward: after successfully raising your children (and having the worry lines to prove it), you could put your feet up, have some me-time, and take a bath in peace.

Today, it’s a very different scenario. Those fledglings you waved goodbye to not so long ago are likely to fly back again. Millions of parents are now putting a roof over the heads of the so-called ‘boomerang generation’. As many as one in five working adults aged 20 to 34 moved back into their parents’ or grandparents’ home between 2014 and 2015, according to research from Shelter. And it’s thought that four in 10 young people currently live at home, thanks to a combination of high housing costs, rising debt and stagnant incomes.

‘The sad fact is that millions of people are being forced to put their lives on hold because there are nowhere near enough affordable homes available,’ says Kate Webb, head of policy and research at Shelter. ‘Young people at the start of their careers or in low-paid industries are being forced to fork out more and more of their monthly income just to keep a roof over their heads. And when paying rent is like being stuck on a hamster wheel, it’s no surprise that so many are choosing to move back in with their parents.’

Of course, we can’t turn our cherished offspring away – but living under the same roof isn’t easy. So what can we do to prevent a descent into a bigger version of the teen wars we thought we’d left behind?