Do you remember when you were young enough to say: “When I grow up I want to ... have a house with a garden/be a vet/fly to space/get married?” It was a lighthearted conversation encouraged by older generations to inspire ambition. But now you’ve grown up, how many of the more moderate goals have you achieved? And how many have you filed under “unobtainable”?

Young adults’ incomes are now as much as 20% below the national average, as revealed by a Guardian investigation this week. Low incomes, coupled with rising living costs, debt and a lack of employment mean that some of us are not only unlikely to fulfil our more inventive childhood fantasies, but will fail to meet even the basic milestones of adulthood: a full-time permanent job, a life partner, a home, a pension and earning enough every month to put something into a savings account.

Here Guardian readers share their experiences of missing milestones.

1. Living alone, or owning a home

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Stable, secure housing is becoming more and more out of reach for young single people. Photograph: Sara Lynn Paige/Getty Images/Flickr

I worry that I will never be able to afford stable, secure housing as a single person on a low income who works in London. This week I learned that my landlord is putting the rent up by 20% in the house-share I share with three other people. I already pay half my monthly income just to live in this house-share. There is nowhere in London I could afford to rent a place on my own on my income, not even in zone 6 (and even if I found a studio flat I could just about afford on the outskirts of London, commuting costs would then tip it back into unaffordability). Will my only choice be to endure the stress of a constantly rotating stream of housemates, moving house every time a landlord decides to spike the rent or sell? Since moving to London five years ago to find work, I have already lived in five different flats and had 16 different housemates. I don’t care about owning property, I just want some stability. The only way I could potentially afford to move to a one-bedroom flat is if I was in a position to cohabit with a partner, but I’m currently single and that really doesn’t feel within my control. If it did happen I would like it not to be driven by economic compulsion.” – Catherine, 30, London

That I will never be able to provide a home for my two children. I work three jobs and I earn quite a lot of money – above the national average. But on a single income, I can’t get a mortgage for a two-bed flat. I need to stay near London where my work is and the children’s father lives. I want to have a stable affordable home for my children, but that seems increasingly out of reach. Each time I get a better-paid job, the housing market jumps further out of reach. I did all the things we were told to do – I went to a top university and graduated with a good degree. I have trained and upskilled and taken every opportunity possible. I am well-paid and in secure employment, but on a single income, housing is my nightmare.” – Jane, 29, Essex

I gave up long ago the dream of owning my own home and realise I will never be able to decorate where I live and have my own furnishings. It is also stressful to realise that I will always be competing with others for the best-value places to rent, as others will be in the same situation. The fact that I’ve not been able to afford enough driving lessons to get to pass my test, so far, limits my choice, as I have to rent somewhere that is walking distance to the hospital where I work, as public transport is not available on some of the days I need to work. Inevitably this means my rent costs will be high, even though I gave up the idea of being closer to my parents and other family members in the south-east. Having to rent does stop you making changes that would help you save costs, for example my studio flat has poor insulation and only an electric heater, so the electricity costs are higher than I would like.” – Kirsty, 26, Nottingham

2. Finding a long-term partner, and living together

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Party time at the Dalston Superstore club in Hackney, London. Photograph: Alamy

The idea of having a stable relationship and building a family any time soon seems like a very distant dream due to the geographical mobility I have had to have to get my career to this point. By all measures I had things much better than my parents did up until I was about 22 years old. However, a few years down the line and I cannot help but think I’m now falling behind their generation. The house that they bought when they were my age is far beyond my financial reach despite me having a better-paid job than they had. Saving for a deposit is near impossible while paying extortionate rents for barely habitable flatshares. I have to ask myself, after trying to do the ‘right’ thing throughout my teens and early 20s (study hard, get a career, travel and broaden your mind), is it ever really going to pay off?” – Ben, 27, Southampton

Through a combination of a frugal lifestyle and family support, I’m now in a position to buy my own home, and yet I’m stalling. I’ve gotten comfortable with shared living, and I dread the thought of returning to an empty house every night. My job takes up a lot of my time, and while I’ve made some good friends through work it’s not the sort of environment where I’m likely to meet anyone special. In the short term I can replace these interactions, but I dread the hard landing of finding myself alone at Christmas, the awkwardness of explaining why I’m not going on holiday this year. I have no one to go with, no one to be with, and I hate it.

I had relationships at university, but nothing stuck. Since moving to a new city I’ve just not made those connections and now I’ve been single so long the idea of dating is terrifying.” – Jonathan, 28, Manchester

I rarely see this ‘millennial worry’ mentioned. I’ve done very well for myself, worked hard, have an excellent job and even managed to buy a property with a little help from my family. This has been at the expense of my personal relationships though, and I’m moving into a stage of life where there is no slack that can be picked up by a partner in the home. I am the only person cooking, cleaning, taking care of the bills, etc. and it is exhausting. Even finding time to date and rectify the situation is exhausting. I’ve had to be upfront and say on Tinder that I’m a workaholic to explain why I frequently cancel dates. I remember in the late 80s and early 90s there was a stereotype on TV of the successful career woman with an unfulfilling home life. My home life isn’t unfulfilling, I date and have friends and mostly enjoy myself, but it feels as though my work etc. expect me to have a partner who’ll do things like make me dinner when I’ve been working for 12 hours straight. As it is, the takeout drivers know me very well.”

3. Working in a full-time, permanent job

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Office workers during the morning rush-hour in Southwark in central London. Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters

Job instability is my greatest worry. I used to say I hoped to own a small house of my own with a small garden, in a small town with a train station – and I can’t see even that much happening now. At the moment, I’m working on a freelance and casual basis, while volunteering on the side to increase my skillset. This is the way jobs in my sector are going, but as soon as I can I’ll want to get at least a part-time permanent job to support my other work – but I don’t know when that’ll happen. My parents were already married with a house by this point. I’m very fortunate that they are allowing me to live at home at the moment, or I don’t know how I’d manage.” – Caroline, 23, Kent

I’m lucky to have a decent job, but I’ve never had a contract that lasts longer than a year as they’ve always been fixed term. I think this means there’s little investment in me as an employee because they know I won’t be around for long. After about eight months I have to start thinking about applying for jobs, which is such a soul-destroying and confidence-sucking process. Until today though, I don’t think I’d realised just how precarious my existence is; I went to the dentist and I need to get three fillings. I don’t actually think I can afford them. As with many of the other people sharing their stories here, I don’t have a savings safety net. If I lost my job or something went wrong I wouldn’t be able to last a month without having to ask my parents for help.” – Faye, 25, Oxford

On one side, I have the people I knew while growing up becoming shelf-stackers and mailmen, telling me I won’t make it. On the other hand, university friends becoming solicitors, bankers and civil servants, telling me I can and I have no idea who to believe. However, there’s one distinction: the ones being successful either come from established professional families who guided them or they had a lucky break. I have had neither. At this point I’m tired, all I want is an office job, any office job. After all of that, I’ll see my friends and family and if they ask, everything is going well. I keep my mouth shut and I keep trying, but at the end of every day before going to bed, I lie there staring at the ceiling, thinking ‘What am I doing?’” – Julius, 24, London

My biggest worry is never having a permanent job. Since graduating from university in 2014, I have gone from six-month contract to six-month contract, with a period of unemployment in the middle. I now have a slightly more secure job with an 18-month contract, but how am I even going to get a phone on contract or sign a lease on a flat if I don’t know if I’ll have a job in two years? I still live at home, and at 23, I’ve managed to accrue lots of belongings that my childhood bedroom is simply too small for. I yearn to escape and begin my adult life, but I feel like a reluctant Peter Pan.” – Lauren, 23, Glasgow

4. Having children

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Starting a family is becoming an unaffordable ambition for some young people. Photograph: Cultura Creative/Alamy

I want a family but don’t see how I’ll ever be able to afford one. I can’t even afford a one-bed flat! I don’t have family to help me with that, so after the end of full maternity pay childcare would be more than my income. I hate that as a woman I’m so preoccupied with this, but there is an actual fixed time period in which I can do this and it’s looking like I won’t be able to. We need women my age to have kids. We need there to be a future generation. But how?” – Kat, 27, London

I worry how on earth I will afford to have the children I so desperately want while still progressing my career and having a stable place to live. As a woman, of course, I have a limited time frame to have children – but I don’t see how it’s possible to save enough to support a family in the next few years. I was always told that if I worked hard at school and university I would be able to get a good job with a good salary and have a good career. But it took me three years after graduating of internships and volunteering to get the experience all starting jobs seemed to require before I finally got on the first rung of the career ladder: an extremely high-pressured job for a charity in London that paid £18,000 a year. I was led to believe that my starting salary upon graduating at 21 would be around £22,000! Now, at the age of 29, I’m finally on a salary that enables me to start saving – but I don’t feel I have enough time to save enough to have children. And buying a house? Forget it!” – Ellie, 29, London

5. Saving for the future

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Student debt is a big worry for many graduates. Photograph: Alamy

My biggest worry is never being able to get out of the debt I’ve got myself into. I dropped out of university within six weeks of my course starting due to a mental health issue for which I got no support. I was unemployed for a year after, feeling as though I’d never get a job after getting rejection upon rejection, all down to my lack of experience. I couldn’t get out of my accommodation contract, meaning I went well into my overdraft, which fortunately I was not charged interest on, and I left it six months before I finally started ‘on the dole’ as I really didn’t want to have to rely on JSA [jobseeker’s allowance] and was worried I’d end up lost in the system. I’ve been in my current job for 18 months, but I’m not earning enough to get out of the hole I’m in. I probably won’t be for some time to come and my overdraft ceases to be interest-free come the summer.” – Jason, 21, Doncaster

I worry that everyone else has more savings than me even though I feel like I save harder than anyone I know. It took me two years to land a proper job after graduating from university in 2010, and because of the competitive and exploitative industry I work in, I’ve only just started to be paid over £20,000 a year (although I now live in London, which makes up for the difference). Despite all this, I have managed to save £5,000. But I worry that it’s not enough, or anywhere near as much as I should have by this age.” – Laura, 27, London