In my personal experience, it’s about 50/50 this and lack of home ownership. Whenever I talk to someone 60+, with kids, who is downsizing out of the old family home they inevitably mention having to sell (or more likely scrap or donate) most of their old furniture because their kids either don’t want it or don’t own a home to put it in (and are renting somewhere too small).
Many of their kids, people in my peer group, are in their 30s to early 40s now and still aren’t married and don’t have kids and don’t own a home.
I’ve got a family and a house and I still wouldn’t want any of the old, quality furniture my parents have. It’s just not anything I have a need for.
I think it's a bunch of reasons but agree it's probably 50/50. I can certainly relate to having no where to put stuff when my grandparents passed away, so I took one item I could fit into my bedroom.
Another reason is, the craftspeople to maintain this furniture is much rarer. I have a dressing table that was my great grandmothers. It's a beautiful piece and solid as a rock but it's showing wear and tear of daily use every day of my life (and who knows when it was previously restored). Finding someone capable of restoring it is hard, and it's a long manual process which would cost substantially more than buying a new piece. I'll never part with the thing but I doubt I'll ever get it restored either.
My mother has an old settee that was her aunts. It's falling apart needing new springs and upholstery. She's been on a waiting list to get it repaired for years, and the upholsterer isn't taking more clients as he's past retirement age and now does it just a few days a week with a backlog of years.
Refinishing, on the other hand, is mostly not fun. The chemistry ranges from slow and ineffective to fast and not great to spend a lot of time around (and increasingly hard to buy as a muggle). Veneers on anything even semi-modern are paper-thin and you risk sanding through them. Nooks and crannies are a pain to get old finish out of, even with the help of chemistry.
And there's always the risk that someone used Pledge (or something else with silicone oil in it) on the piece in the past. Which you won't discover until you get the first coat of new finish on and get fisheye.
Upholstery, at least, can be fun. A lot of upholsterers do reupholstery work, and many are quite good at it. If at first you don't find someone who can do tied springs, keep looking; they're out there.
Many of their kids, people in my peer group, are in their 30s to early 40s now and still aren’t married and don’t have kids and don’t own a home.
I’ve got a family and a house and I still wouldn’t want any of the old, quality furniture my parents have. It’s just not anything I have a need for.