The phenomenon has had a transformative effect, with BoMaD rising to become the equivalent of the country’s ninth biggest mortgage lender.

In total, it is estimated that parents will lend more than £6.5bn this year, with 62% of under-35s receiving such support when purchasing a home.

However, parents do not just play an important role in the property market by providing finances to their children to help them buy homes; a huge number of properties in the UK are also passed down by parents to younger generations in their wills.

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To extend our understanding of the role played by family support and inheritance within the real estate industry, MFS has released a new report shedding light on the property portfolios of baby boomers and UK retirees, and the sentiments of those in line to inherit them.

In England alone, it is estimated that £1.5 trillion worth of property is owned by those aged 55 or over. With the UK’s over-55 population set to grow by a third over the next 20 years, this figure could reach almost £2 trillion by 2036.

With hundreds of billions of pounds worth of property set to be inherited by millennials through family members and friends in the decades to come, MFS’s research uncovers the challenges and opportunities faced by millennials inheriting real estate.

Based on a nationally representative survey of 2,000 UK adults, the research reveals how many millennials have, or will be, inheriting a property in the coming years, the average value of the property inherited, what millennials plan on doing with their inherited real estate and the barriers preventing them from executing their ideal property investment strategy.