Ridiculous question about living in London

[Skunkandnancy]

I’ve just come back from a few days in London. We stayed in Paddington (Sussex gardens), just across the road from the station.

I LOVE London and when I get back I’m always a bit fascinated and think about it a lot. Where we stayed there appeared to be ‘normal’ flats just along from Sussex Gdns where people were just living.

I know it sounds absolutely ridiculous but I can’t get my head around being able to live right in the middle of London like this. Surely it must cost a fortune. It was noisy at night (all night partying it sounded like) so how do people just live alongside this.

We walked up Whitehall, around Covent Garden, Fleet Street, St Paul’s etc and am just fascinated at the thought that people live amongst this. I look at people on the tube and imagine just being able to travel around like this so easily.

London history is so fascinating too, so much to see everywhere. Do ‘ordinary’ people live right in the centre like this? How is life? I bet it must be amazing 🤩

I’m a Londoner born and bred. Parents ran a shop in Earls Court; we lived above it. I went to one of those ‘schools in houses’. We had swimming lessons at Imperial College’s swimming pool and PE in Hyde Park. Didn’t have a garden at home until we moved slightly further out (Fulham) when I was 11. I loved it. I got the bus or tube to secondary school so navigate public transport easily, and traffic noise soothes me to sleep 😂

Obviously cannot afford to bring my own children up in zone 1, so we are zone 3 but I’m hoping to give them a similar childhood.

I used to live in Bayswater round the corner and absolutely adored it. Admittedly in 20s/30s pre kids. One of the best times of my life.

I loved in Zone 2 in a shared flat above a pub. Absolutely best time with everything on my doorstep, and travel cost nothing as he walked/bussed/biked.

It felt very odd to go stay with family in the burbs where everything seemed to close ay 7!

It was also cheaper for me to live in the city rather than cheaper rent further away but extortionate train fares.

Yes, ordinary people do live in the centre. It will be a mix of incomes, as there are housing estates even in the richest areas. So you'll get rich/well off who own their own houses living next to council estates. Supermarkets are everywhere, they are just well hidden (in back streets) in the richer areas.

We were on holiday in Bayswater and saw some big but normal ish looking homes with people watering their plants or painting their fences. I was fascinated by the whole idea, just like you OP.

I've loved reading this thread, I love visiting London.

Some people weigh up the cost of commuting, which for two people could easily be £800 to £1000 a month from nearby counties or suburbs, if not more. Add that to your rent but have more time to yourself I guess so the housing could be worth it. Maybe less of an issue now people can work from home though.

I love London and fantasise about renting a flat for a month or two to live like the locals do, just walking everywhere and pottering around seeing places.

I live in London, next to a tube station, so can be anywhere in about 15 minutes. I love that aspect and I love that there are always new things to discover about London even after living here for more than 40 years… BUT it’s noisy, smelly and I often daydream about being somewhere quiet and green.. when I take the train through the countryside and see a little house on its own in the middle of nowhere I have the same feeling you described OP: sort of like, wow, do people actually live there , must be amazing! So envious of all that space..

Most of those in Paddington are not flats they are hotels and hostels . I have worked in the area for years with homelesss people so I know

There is also next to no housing in the other areas u mentioned also , again hotels and hostels

when i was in central london recently, there were private locked gardens I lived in staff nhs accommodation near regents park, the binmen came every day.
i just walked everywhere, as said above, oxford street was so busy on a saturday.
there was a sainsburys in camden (i tinink) but going back now there are a lot of sainsburys extras, there was a tesco in Goodge Street.
i left when pregnant as it seemed the right thing to do but i love to go back

@IvorCutler I live in Devon and no property available here either. The state of this country at the moment is truly frightening.

Know exactly what you mean. We stayed on Sussex gardens last year, and was fascinated how everything was on doorstep, food, shopping and travel wise everything was so convenient. I found the tube, its network and timings genius, was in love with being able to travel and get to places with so much ease. Wasn't the usual London rush as people were still working from home, might be more difficult when back to normal. Only gripe was that had to buy bottled water for tea, and people weren't as helpful as I was used to (live in bradford).

Last week spent a few days in Chester and was again fascinated of how well history and architecture was maintained and incorporated in to modem use. I thought do people living here get excited about the city wall, Roman architecture etc like we were

OP I lived in a super cheap hostel kind of place for ages once smack bang in the middle of London.i bloody loved it!! I was early 20s though, all about partying, working all hours, friends everywhere of every nationality, walked everywhere cause we couldn't afford a taxi (if it was too late for the tube)...it was noisy, busy, crazy and wonderful. It'd drive me round the bend now, though 🤣

I spent a period of life living in a flat share about 5 min walk to Victoria train station.

At night - we used to walk home from nights out in the west end via the parks. I didn't have a garden so used to sunbath in green park. I can't really remember it being anymore expensive ( we had a good deal on rent) compared to living in zone 2/3.

Also living in the borough of Westminster - ironically council tax was very low due to amount of business rate contributions. So that was a plus

buy bottled water for tea - why? You can drink London tap water.

@Catch21 I would guess it's due to the taste. It tastes different to northern water as it's very hard water.

A colleague of mine lives in a council flat off High Holborn. Another lives in South Ken, another council flat.

There's council housing all over zone 1.

I used to rent a room near the Elephant. Happy times. It's now a sanitised regenerated s-hole.

You get teabags for hard water

my dog was raised in Yorkshire and really dislikes London tap. I read somewhere that water has a smell to dogs

my cousins council house in the London suburbs is 2.5k a month rent. I have absolutely no idea how anyone is affording that let alone private rent or a mortgage. It's not even a nice area :/

Great thread and am getting a vicarious thrill from reading all your stories. I'm as Irish as they come and live in the country in the west of Ireland yet have always been fascinated by London and devour books in particular set there but also films and TV programmes. I've spent many long weekends there but my absolute dream is to at some stage spend a solid month or two right in the city and just wake up every morning and think, 'what corner will I explore today?' I like to think that somebody with a teeny weeny flat there would have a similar dream to spend a few months in the west of Ireland (in a three bedroomed house with a garden!). Maybe even a mumsnetter....It's at least 8 years away when my youngest is reared and gone but a girl can dream.

I have often thought this!

Surely there must be others around who think like this!
Sort of a cultural entire lifestyle exchange, only for mature adults rather than young students. With something already in common, in this case, Mumsnet (although I don’t have children myself, I’ve recently been a “step” mum.

I think there are online home swap for holidays type websites, but it sounds a bit too anonymous for me. Airbnb just for a few days has had to suffice for now. Hotels can never give you that full immersion feeling, they are a bit cold and soulless. I like to have the feeling of a home with all the quirks that represent the culture and people of that location.

I dream of living somewhere near the sea...I can't even imagine how amazing it must be to see the sea every day.

I grew up in Zone 1, walked to one of those schools in a house over sleeping homeless people. There was a hostel on the same street as our school and I found the residents fairly terrifying at times.

As a child I loved going to the museums and the theatre and my parents did a lot of cultural things with us. But more than that I loved going out to the countryside to visit family/friends.

As a tween in winter I used to start feeling sick towards the end of the school day about going home in the dark because so many of my friends had been mugged, but it was alright as I got older and of course I loved living in London ages 14-18 when we would go to gigs all the time.

Now I live rurally in Scotland and can’t stand the place, I can manage a visit for 2/3 days but then I get so itchy to get out. It really hit home to me when I first moved up here that coming home from holidays to London brought a sense of dread but coming home from holidays to rural Scotland brought a sense of peace!

@MrsWombat The Morrisons up by Chalk Farm? My best friend lived there and we always shopped at that Morrisons for house parties (at some point it was a Safeways, can’t remember when it changed). Now that does bring back happy memories!

Not so! I lived in central London throughout my 20s and 30s. It was great. Rented. Not on any big income, by any stretch of imagination, simply that most of my income went on rent! I felt this was worth it. Studio flats or one beds is what I stretched to. Obvs Moved out after I had kids. Agree that To afford a house is for the mega rich!