Not that many people can buy a House ( even a Car these days ) without using Credit.
Can't speak to what the UK situation is. But here in the States, there's a few curious trends.
There is no such thing anymore as an inexpensive home. JB, a Eww Toober, did a walk-through of some Texas "affordable housing" properties, while transiting across the southern United States from Calistania.
The homes were on lots scarcely bigger than the structure. And the structures were RIDICULOUSLY small and narrow.
Asking price was in the $140k range. In the economy of 20 years ago, those would have been, not just less money - they'd have been unsaleable at any price. And IMHO, they will again be unsaleable. No space, land the size of a vegetable garden, and a whole lot of not-very-nice people buying in (occupied homes in that development were using rags or sheets as draperies, obvious from the road.
Okay, that's homes. Cars? While the average new-car price inches towards $50k (what I paid for a house, 23 years ago) AFFORDABLE cars are DISAPPEARING. Ford axed almost all their car models - only the Mustang and some BEV scheisse remains on the lines. GM, also. First they discontinued their compact cars, using Korean (Daewoo) models as rebadged Chevrolets, and then just stopped even pretending.
All of them have. Even Nissan, which is becoming Japan's Studebaker. They cut their evergreen affordable models for 2026. And Mitsubishi discontinued its Poverty Special, the Mirage. Which was not a bad car, just an unglamorous, primitive one (primitive for today. It was a better car than economy models in the 1980s).
They just ARE NOT SELLING. Almost all vehicles in the US are now four-wheel-drive. And those stupid lifted four-door, two-row trucks, with tiny boxes in back and $90k price tags, are what the makers are focusing on. They sold well until the last two years.
Used? A North Carolina used-car dealer, Brandon, who runs three Eww Toob channels...he sells cars under $5000. Seems like an honest guy. He has said constantly that he LIKES cars with blemishes like burned paint, because he can buy them cheap and sell them at low prices to people who just want a work car.
This week he's stopped that - a philosophy shift. His sales team says they can't get people interested in cars with damaged paint or factory-stock wheels. EVERYONE WANTS BLING. They'll buy cars with KNOWN issues, because it's got a loud paintjob with trim, and ghetto rims.
So I blame the drugging and dumbing-down of the (m)asses for all this.
How does it tie in with your point? SAVING for, and then buying-within-budget, a car or other large purchase, takes discipline and planning - intelligence. We don't seem to have that anymore. Look at Zac Rio's channel on all the young people who've gotten into the hundreds-of-thousands into debt - with stupid car choices, or just living on those stupid credit cards and BNPL programs.
The problem seems, not so much inability to save, as, inability to think, plan, budget, and live within one's means.