If you left central London to move further out...

[ElkieMacjibe]

Do you have any regrets? Where djd you move to?

has anyone managed to defy the odds and stay in London?
Depends what you mean by London. Quite a few here have said they moved from z1 to z2. Those are both London to me. As is z3, etc. Most people I know live in flats with their families, usually a two-bed but sometimes one. I’m in two-bed house and have three children. It depends what you can compromise on.

I grew up in London. Until I was 33 I had never lived outside zone 2 (except while at uni).

We moved out to Hertfordshire commuter belt when the DC were little and don't regret it. Nice big garden, lambs in the field across the road, my kids went to the village nursery and primary school (they've left now). And the commute into the city only takes 20 mins longer than when we lived in north London!

It's a really agonising decision. I feel like it's 'giving up' to leave London which is very melodramatic and ridiculous! I'm sure it's lockdown talking but I have such garden envy - ooh to have a bbq and an enclosed space to let the toddler run free.

Definitely no regrets here. Moved from central London (v busy, touristy part) to the (commutable) countryside.

I still work in the City and so my journey time has obviously increased, but despite being a longer commute, it's actually far more pleasant than taking the horribly overcrowded and dirty Central Line to work every day. I get a seat without fail on a consistently reliable train and can work, read or watch a box set. Absolutely no issues at all.

The difference living somewhere surrounded by wildlife and stunning beauty has made to our quality of life is astounding, weekends feel like being on holiday. I wouldn't move back to London for anything.

@ElkieMacjibe i feel the same. Its also worth considering your own employment options and industry- if you lost or left your current job, is it easy to find another wfh job? Commuting can be very difficult and given the state of government debt, travel costs would be overwhelmingly carried by the consumers. We are getting a 4% rise in TFL fares this year and end to kids fares. When your monthly travelcard is £160, its easier to stomach it.

For me, this crisis has taught me that your BASE cost should be as low as possible. then you can save 20% in the good times, and 50% during lockdown. In London, your main cost is mortgage. But if you add ever increasing commuting costs to the equation and increased amount of childcare incurred by train delays, additional costs of getting an extra car, your costs become more unpredictable and its harder to save.

Lots of people commute into London from Newark or Grantham, about an hour to kings cross and you'd get a lot for your money in terms of houses, and grammar schools in Lincolnshire too

@ElkieMacjibe i totally get the 'giving up' thing. It does sound melodramatic but that's how it feels. Sometimes I have to remind myself that this is one of the most expensive places to live in the world! It's a bubble and it's not normal anywhere else in the U.K. for a 2 bed flat to cost £700k.

The stupid thing for me is that nowadays I hardly ever do 'London things' apart from when I have visitors. I guess I just like to know they are there...

So true @taraRoo we live next to a road of amazing restaurants and bars and rarely go to them as a couple because of the kids. I do think the opportunities as the kids get older would be amazing in London though. But would they just prefer to have a big garden?!

On the flip side of the giving up thing (which I do get), it can be quite nice to admit to yourself that realistically, you are never going to go back to a lifestyle where you are out until late every night at cool bars and restaurants, then get up early to spend the day touring London's cultural and historic amenities and going to the theatre or a concert in the afternoon... I mean how many people did that anyway on a regular basis, even in their 20s living in central London, and if you really find you miss it, it's hardly very difficult to pop back in on the train, the money you are saving on the mortgage will pay for the taxi home! You aren't going to the end of the world after all. But also, do give yourself permission to spend a lazy Saturday at the park with the kids and the dog, or go down the local of an evening with some not-very-chic mates before doing a dinner run at the local supermarket, without feeling guilty that you really ought to be on a protest march or seeing the latest exhibition at the Tate because otherwise you aren't 'making the most of London', it's quite liberating!

I have a bit of a fantasy that one day when we retire we'll downsize from the family home and spend the cash on a teeny tiny bolthole somewhere central, and really throw ourselves back into London and go to the theatre every night etc., although also that does sound a bit exhausting as well, maybe we'll stay where we are and spend the money on wine and nice holidays instead - philistine alert !

@ElkieMacjibe

Dolly Alderton on Growing up in stanmore:
When I was eight years old, my parents made the cruel decision to move us out of a basement flat in Islington and into a larger house in Stanmore; the last stop on the Jubilee line and on the very furthest fringes of North London. It was the blank margin of the city an observer of the fun, rather than a reveller at the party.

When you grow up in Stanmore, you are neither urban or rural. I was too far out of London to be one of those cool kids who went to the Ministry of Sound and dropped their 'g's and wore cool vintage clothes picked up in surprisingly good Oxfams in peckham Rye. But I was too faraway from the Chilterns to be one of those ruddy-cheeked feral country teenagers who wore old fisherman jumpers and learnt to drive their dad's Citroen when they were 13 and went on walks and took acid in a forest with their cousins. The North London suburbs were a vacuum for identity. It was as beige as the plush carpets that adorned its every home. There was no art, no culture, no old buildings, no parks, no independent shops and restaurants. There were golf clubs and branches of Prezzo and private schools and driveways and roundabouts and retail parks and glass roofed shopping centres. The women looked the same, the houses were built the same, the cars were all the same. The only form of expression was through the spending of money on homogenized assets- conservatories, kitchen extensions, cars with inbuilt satnav, all inclusive holidays to majorca. Unless you played golf, or wanted your hair highlighted or to browse a Volkswagen showroom, there was absolutely nothing to do. This was particularly true if you were a teenager at the mercy of your mother's availability to cart you around in her aforementioned Volkswagen Golf GTI.

Honestly if I was lucky enough to be born in London, I would be gutted to leave.

And on the point of the opportunities for kids in outer London vs inner, most kids I know that lived in zones 4 or 5 were perfectly able to pop into central on the tube, or to a mates house on the bus with their siblings or friends from their mid-teens onwards, earlier in some cases, a lot of them took themselves to school on the tube or bus from secondary onwards, so they could do similar journeys on the weekends. It really made little difference to their opportunities whether they lived in zone 1 or zone 4 - TBH most teens seem to prefer lounging with around their mates playing xbox or kicking a ball around the park to amazing cultural or social opportunities available in central London anyway but I don't see you moving a bit further out as denying them anything in either case, and arguably if they are sporty there are better opportunities/facilities a bit further out?

@maxelly i dunno, DH grew up in zone 3 north london and he loved the classical music concerts in Conway hall and loved going to art museums i.e. tate modern since he was a kid , and this continued when he was a teenager. He had a Young Friend Membership at the Royal Academy of Art and he used to bring girls with him on very cheap dates. Also in London, if you are a skint teenage boy, its far easier to impress girls. Just bring them to the heath, can't beat the romance.

Which is why DH refuses point blank to move to Bucks. He wants to stay in zone 3 or more central if we can afford.

Yeah, @Desiringonlychild I guess I was really talking about the difference between suburban outer London and central, rather than home counties vs London. Personally I grew up in a small home counties town and it definitely was different to DH's London upbringing (not necessarily worse but certainly different), but I still maintain that if you have an arty child it is perfectly possible for them to spend Saturday afternoons at the tate and generally develop their talent without having to live in central London (and same goes for music or sport or drama or whatever their talent is). The vast majority of kids are not privileged enough to live in zone 1 or even 2 and get along just fine...

TBH IMO teenagers will find things to be unhappy and moany about whatever their situation, they live in a small flat in zone 1 - they have no personal space, can't have their friends over and are miserable, they live in a semi in zone 4 - they are too far away from London and its boring, they live in a mansion in Bucks - the village is too gossipy and conservative, they live on the moon - it's cold and no gravity, they are a millionaire and live in a palace - their diamond shoes are too tight and their butler brought them cold tea this morning . Please don't choose where you live by trying to guess what will make your teens happy, you'll just end up the unfortunate subject of unflattering pieces when your teen grows up to be a cool edgy journo either way You are paying the mortgage at the end of the day, pick what will make you happiest I say!

Obviously I am being a bit tongue in cheek and considerations about schools etc will of course play into your decision, but don't expect your teens to thank you for it!

@maxelly I guess because I grew up in one of the most boring cities in the world, Singapore, I hope that my child would have a more exciting childhood than I did. And singapore is a city of 5 million people- it has shopping centres and parks and restaurants and lots of good food options, but nothing much in terms of culture. But I would argue that it has more to do than most UK dormitory towns.

I can't really blame my parents for that as its not like they could move country that easily. But am envious of DH. The kind of places he went as a child for free, I could only visit a few days a year (and after my parents paid thousands of pounds for us to fly across the world).

With your commute I’d go south and look at places with trains going into Waterloo or London Bridge.

We were very iffy about leaving the tube (West Hampstead then Clapham) but we are now Zone 6 with a fast train service into Waterloo so the commute is still pretty manageable.

I grew up in inner North London and then lived centrally, going to the cinema and theatre every week etc.

Moving to the burbs in my 40s did feel like a big lifestyle change, even though geographically I’m not that far from where I grew up.

But in a way, it’s less frustrating being a bit further from the bright lights than seeing all the cultural stuff I used to love but never getting a chance to go, because of having a small child.

I agree with @maxelly that you don't need to live in central London for your DC to get the benefit of it. Home Counties can be best of both worlds. Good schools, fresh air, loads of countryside to roam in. But near enough to London to catch major exhibitions, shows and just generally hang out. My DC explored London from our town from the age of about 13/14. They still love it now.

@monkeyonthetable which town do you live in? I am quite attracted to the Home Counties and am always trying to persuade DH. But I haven't found any town that fits my requirements- multicultural, good private and state schools/quick connection to St Johns Wood/marylebone area/the city, preferably a jewish community.

I find Little Chalfont, St Albans, Beaconsfield, Guildford most attractive. Beaconsfield is too £££. The good state secondary schools in St Albans are too far from the station which might be tricky if you can't continue paying private for secondary. little chalfont is good as it is on the met line and you can get 4 tube trains an hour plus the chiltern train but its a village and you have to go elsewhere to do big supermarket shopping. guildford is quite expensive for commuting fares.

Just leave, seriously. Best thing we ever did. The commute is not any worse than it was from zone 2 to Canary Wharf (ten mins on packed overground and then queueing for however long to squeeze onto jubilee line.) Now it's longer but much more pleasant - seats! I'm hoping we can wfh more often in future which will be wonderful. We're in Tunbridge Wells now.

I agree that there's a time to live in lots of different places. What works perfectly for a teen isn't the same necessarily as for a 40 year old and of course lots of teens and lots of 40 year olds want different things too.

I think most of us hanker after something of our youth. It might be where we spent our teen years or more likely where we were students or spent what now seems like carefree 20s. One of the things about carefree 20s is that is was usually spent where we chose and not our parents.

I'd say that if you live in the burbs of zones 4,5,6 or in the Home Counties with fast direct travel to London in less than an hour, there is access to the stuff Lomdon has for you and your kids. It's not the same as having your corner shop as some wonderful ethnic supermarket that you only find in a certain part of London, or nipping to a gallery on a whim and being there in 10 minutes, but for those who want access and regular access it is ....accessible burbs and home counties.

For most small children, a garden is worth a lot. For most teens, fully accessing all Lomdon has to offer won't happens here've they live , but for those who want it, it's there for all those who can get in easily at the weekend. And then, when they are in their 20s, if they really want central London living, then is the time to have it, because they can choose and they can make if it what they will, which is why so many of us love it - because we chose to do it in our 20s. And maybe we will do it again in our 50s or 60s......or just choose to travel in more frequently from the burbs and Home Counties, whilst also enjoying gardens and spare rooms.

Life changes and so we live in places that suit us for the time we are in now and which might not have suited us in our glorious youth or imagined golden retirement, but which give us the best compromise for everyone in our family now. More private inside and outside space feels like a need for most growing families and drives them out, but if you think speedier access to cultural highlights and diversity etc etc is worth more, then remaining might be right....even if it's just for a short while longer.

@WombatChocolate Wise words!

Yep, moved one year ago and whilst we have moved back to the city in which I grew up this past 12 months has been shit awful.

We had the choice to move somewhere a bit pedestrian (Woking or MK - I am sorry if that is offensive I do not mean it as such). We chose Scotland as I know it and researched transferability of jobs.

Big mistake. Just a big fucking mistake. It’s beautiful and our house is ace but I wish we had moved to fucking Woking. For so many boring reasons, but the main one being job security and being able to live a normal 9-5 with the train from Waterloo every evening and just the whole lot. Fuck.

Basically to answer the OP

If you want a garden and 80-100 sq.m space and maybe just maybe a garage there are bags of places that teeter around the 400 - 500K range, typical for a large 3 bed somewhere like Purley, Woking, Potters Bar etc.

What about places like Pinner, Northwood,, Rickmansworth? (Zones 5 or 6) On the tube with villagey parts. All expensive but Chelsea than central London.

Or going south to Wimbledon or further to Surbtion or Reigate or Dorking? Or Seven Oaks or Tunbridge Wells?

I've known retired people living in these places who are frequently in London and over-nighting and getting their fill, whilst also having big houses for al the extended family to come and stay in. Some even have a little flat as a bolt hole or an on-going AirBnB arrangement which means they've essentially got a 2nd home without the costs of a 2nd home, and feel like they're living the Lomdon life of their youth again.

Another vote for Stortford here. The schools are excellent and the high street is slowly becoming more and more independent again. There are some excellent restaurants and country pubs in and around the area, as well as lots of lovely tearooms snd cafes. You've got stansted airport on your doorstep which is really handy under normal circumstances and train links to Cambridge, Liverpool Street snd Stratford. Lots of lovely NT properties nearby such as Audley End and Hatfield Forest. An Uber home from a night out in central is around £50. There are some other surrounding villages which might be worth checking out - Matching Green, Stansted Mountfichet, Newport, Hatfield Heath, all of which are also lovely and within close driving distance to a station