Hoooo boy. Buckle up, because Netflix has reached into the millennial soul and pulled out a reality show combining all our deepest nonsense. You’re about to see yourself – at least, your peers, their most profound fears and weirdest priorities – on telly.
Enjoy yourself and primal scream as you watch the trailer for new Netflix show, Marriage or Mortgage.
What is Marriage or Mortgage, the new Netflix show?
Marriage or Mortgage does what it says on the tin: youngish couples are filmed as a wedding planner and an estate agent compete for their business (Nashville-based wedding planner Sarah Miller and real estate agent Nichole Holmes) ultimately deciding whether to spend their savings on a wedding or a house. That’s it, that’s the whole show.
Ok, but why?
Perhaps, in ten years, both marriages and mortgages will have been swept away with the detritus of an old world order – nonetheless, here we are. The generation caught between Gen Z (save us, kids!) and boomers (oh, I bought this house in Camden for a tenner back in 1985) have priorities as skewiff as the world which produced them. The reality is many people are having to choose between a big wedding and a house... we just maybe didn't wanna see that writ large on a TV show.
Gosh, that sounds awful. How did this happen?
Good question! Homeownership and matrimony are both pretty traditional, inherited from a time when they were a) aspirational and b) affordable. Trouble is, your parents’ totally standard benchmarks of adulthood have become hysterically out of reach (and don't even suggest we stop buying Prets for lunch or some similar rubbish) – hence the show, I suppose. Even Marriage or Mortgage’s couples, compelled to choose between the two, will necessarily have more money than most.
Are millennials ok?
Not really. Guess what the average wedding cost in London in 2019. Go on. £10k? 15? Double it and then some – couples there spent more than £31,000 on their Special Day, meaning the average wedding cost more than the average annual wage in the capital that year. Property, meanwhile, is even more eye watering – even discounting London and its oligarchical house prices, the average first-time buyer in the UK spends over TEN TIMES more than their parents, who would have spent around £20,000 in 1980 compared to circa £220,000 in 2020.
So, unless you're rolling in it, for many choosing a roof or a veil over your head is real...
Where is Marriage or Mortgage filmed?
Marriage or Mortgage is filmed in America, but the generational financials copypaste pretty cleanly across the Atlantic. Get ready to scream at the screen, and also just scream, as the adult version of the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment – where toddlers can have one marshmallow now or two if they wait – unfolds in life as in art. Can’t wait, also can’t bear it.
Ok, I’m in. When does Marriage or Mortgage start?
Marriage or Mortgage is available to watch on Netflix now. It landed on March 10.
How can I watch Marriage or Mortgage?
You can catch Marriage or Mortgage on Netflix as part of your subscription (I know you have one, because you’re a millennial).
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