Are there any decent, liveable seaside towns in UK which aren’t silly expensive or horribly rundown?

[Moidershewrote]

Basically that - DH and I would really like to relocate with our 2 primary aged kids to live by the sea (near a sandy beach) in either England or Wales - ideally we’d like a half decent primary / secondary schools, friendly community feel with clubs / kids activities etc and not run down/full of pound shops etc and access to train station within approx 5 miles and local buses would be great. We’d love to live somewhere that is walking distance of a beach.

It feels like we’ve looked into so many places and for one reason or another we end up discounting it - usually because either schools seem crap or no train station or no community feel.

Places we’ve immediately rejected are:

• Kent (grammar schools / Kent test)


• Brighton (too expensive / pebble beach)


• Portsmouth/S’ton/Plymouth (too big / towny feel)


• Essex/Somerset coastline (not the right vibe for us)


• E/W Sussex (not sandy😆)

Would love to hear any personal recommendations from people who have moved to another coastal town with kids / or live in one and think it’s brilliant (and why)🙏 We do love Devon, Dorset, Anglia.. Would consider Wales, or NW/NE England.

Another suggesting Northumberland. It's a super mixed county, with deprived ex miner villages, or expensive but well to do areas. The vibes between towns vary a lot, so you'd really need to book somewhere for a few days and have an explore. The beaches are fucking amazing though.

@Greensleeves I agree with you about Teignmouth being not great, but in the interests of fairness, that first photo is Newton Abbot (also grim).

Cromer in Norfolk is beautiful

Will everyone recommending Northumberland just stop!!!! It is an absolute paradise and the last thing we want is all the folk who can’t afford Cornwall piling up the A1!

It really isn’t.

Love Tenby!

do you need to be down south? The north east coast is stunning, and most places have private/independent school and are a reasonable commute to Leeds or York. Leeds is now the tech and finance capital of uk outside London

Imagine reading the OP and then suggesting Gosport Literally one of the most deprived areas in the country, complete cesspit and the beaches are pebbles.

Hayling isn't quite as bad, but it is run down and the schools are not brilliant. Tbh, you'll struggle to get that whole list within Hampshire.

West Wittering/Chichester way might be better, but not cheap.

Not sure why you'd choose the SE at all if you can go anywhere though, it's much cheaper up north so unless you're tied down here for certain jobs, why bother sticking with it?

Also recommend Whitley Bay / Tynemouth / South Shields area in the north east.

lovely beaches, good communities

Lytham st Anne's is beautiful!
I live in Lancaster which is near cost del Morecambe 🙈 Its a bit run down but with the new Eden project being built in Morecambe I do think things will change ♥️

Yeeeesssss 🤣

Crosby/Waterloo or Wirral (they have grammar schools). All suburbs of Liverpool which is a special city.

And Crosby does have amazing sunsets which Tynemouth/Whitley Bay/South Shields (great as they are) don't.

New forest area is lovely - Lymington, Milford on sea (a little old people like) and Christchurch. Not all sandy beaches, but a stones throw (pun intended) from some gorgeous ones!

Southport isn't run down; it's having loads of money spent on it and plenty of old buildings are being refurbished too

I wouldn't go further north than birkdale

The east coast gets sunrises though!

Great Yarmouth, or other places in Norfolk

What’s wrong with grammar schools?

Lymington has an excellent Waitrose.

North East has stunning beaches. It is quite a bit cooler there than the midlands/south though.

North Devon?
Lots of towns and places with short drives to the beaches.

Great Yarmouth is a dump.

Also someone upthread mentioned the fabulous sandy beaches on the Isle of Wight. Where?! All the ones I went to were shingle or had massive great pebbles all over the place.

I came on to say Whitley bay but I see it’s been said

Rye. Near camber beach and a nice town. I think it's silly to want just a sandy beach, I grew up in hastings (id only recommend the old town / west hill ) and you get rock pools and the sand when the tide is out and pebbles when tide is in which is fine. The old town is lively and theres loads of events like jack in the green, carnival week, fat tuesday which i think is much more important than sand. I actually don't think you'll enjoy living by the seaside if you think so many are run down. They all seem run down in the winter when there's nothing but gale force winds and half the shops shut for winter.

Do you not need to be anywhere geographically, for work or family?

I would honestly look longer term, the sandy beach years are short and a lot of the places mentioned above leak young people massively in their uni years and early twenties because there isn't the work and the housing isn't affordable.