Twentysomething and still living at home

SIR – As a fellow millennial I was shocked to read Callum Finn’s article (“I shouldn’t have to give up fun to leave home”, Features, May 20).

His attitude would seem to suggest that it is his inalienable right to have a full (and expensive) social life, while blaming factors outside his control for his inability to rent a private room.

Has he not considered that he can make limited sacrifices in his social life to put aside money for rent and other costs of living – for example, saying no to a profligate stag do abroad?

Twentysomethings who live by the same philosophy should recognise that saving for the future is a form of spending income.

If this is the attitude that permeates my generation then I fear for our, and the country’s, ability to keep control of our finances over the coming decades. We cannot have our cake and eat it. Robbie Laing

London SW1

SIR – I am of a similar age to Callum Finn’s father, and like him I bought my first house in my twenties in Barnet – a tiny terrace house. My friends thought I was mad, but it got me on the ladder.

If Callum Finn wants to buy a home he can: just stay with Mum and Dad for a few years and save up. Don’t get a car, they’re expensive. Don’t go on foreign stag trips. Have cheap holidays; mine were Youth Hostelling in Scotland, and there were similar aged people with whom I enjoyed a couple of pints at a local pub.

Take a packed lunch to work, and a kettle and some teabags. Ditch the expensive mobile phone contract and use pay-as-you-go, with longer calls using Mum and Dad’s land-line when calls of up to an hour are free.

When you are ready for a mortgage, do not look for a property in a fashionably expensive area. The Lea Valley is one of the cheaper parts of London, easily reached by No 307 bus.

Finally, never rent; the money is wasted and the initial thrill of living away from Mum and Dad is nothing like the thrill of walking into a place and thinking: “This is all mine.” Andrew J Rixon

Hertford