How do we move city without it being massively stressful?

[ibuiltahomeforyou]

My DH and I are ready to leave London. We have a toddler and would like another baby and a better work-life balance. We live in zone 4.

We've identified the city to go to, and have found an area but not viewed any houses yet.

My DH's job is very London-centric while mine is a bit more adaptable.

If we did things in this order:
Spoke to mortgage advisor
Put house up for sale
DH and I look for jobs
Once DH has a job I step up my search
Hopefully sell house
Move

Is that a realistic order? I'd like to ideally move by the autumn.

We did not two years ago (zone 3 to Kent coast)

We did it in the order of:
DH got a new job
Some to mortgage advisor
House on market
Couple of trips down to view houses
DH started new job and lived in cheap rental in the week for 4 weeks till Xmas
I had DC2 at Xmas
Moved to cheap rental when DC2 was 2 weeks
Came back to our house on and off for 6 months
Accepted offer/had offer accepted in February
Sold April
Bought in June

If you are already planning DC2 then you might want to wait till you're pregnant so you can be on mat leave when you move. That made it much less stressful for me!

We did not two years ago was obviously meant to say "We did it two years ago"

We’ve moved areas twice.

The first time DH (then BF) went Wales to London. I stayed (sulked) in Wales for a bit, then got myself together, found a job in London and moved up. If we’d understood the job market better, we would have gone together, as temp work was easily come by then. Could this be a possibility in the area you’re looking at?

We moved out of London 16 years ago when I was expecting DC1. It went something like got pregnant (Feb), put house on market, put deposit on house in Essex which was still being built. Waited for it to be built. Moved June, I commuted for a couple of months, then went on maternity leave. When I returned to work after dc3 I got a job locally. DH continues to commute to London, but his industry is very London-centric for the more interesting stuff. I agree with the PP who says timing it all to coincide with maternity might work well for you, if you can swing it. Especially given that if you move jobs and get pregnant quickly, you won’t necessarily qualify for maternity leave from a new job.

We moved and have rented so can't advise on house buying but we did have a month overlap with the two houses to allow one person in each city to deal with all the bits and bobs. It was totally worth it but it was the most stressful thing I've ever done tbh. The upheaval of a house move away from support networks and two new jobs to settle in to was massive. Be kind to yourself. Be kind to eachother.

Thanks all! We have just had Christmas there and it is so lovely to be near family and friends.

I probably need to start thinking about getting our house on the market and thinking about seeing a mortgage advisor...