Advise on Lincolnshire as a possible relocation for a family of 4.

[dasza79]

Hello all.
We are a family of 4 with a 14yo and a 7yo.
I'm a non-English citizen, the rest of the family are an English/Scottish mix. In the past we have lived in Scottish Highlands, in Edinburgh and it's outskirts.
The last 3 years and a bit we have spent living in rural Portugal, on a project farm (or a constant building site to put it simply), with some livestock, pets, in a small village where kids go to local school.
Living in Portugal has proven to be more challenging than we have expected. It is not dreadful and we don't hate it, just as we never hated our life in the UK. However, we have been humming and harring about possible move back to the UK... Mostly for the sake of the kids - Portuguese youth do not have good prospects in their country and many leave to work abroad. Job market here is truly not great, taxes crippling for an average worker, work ethics are very different from what the UK has to offer. Both kids are relatively happy here but still prefer their homecountry, communication being one of the reasons, grandparents the other...
DH works remotely for a British company, he has a decent salary, nothing flashy, just comfortable enough not to worry about the bills.
I used to work in the UK, my career has always been patchy with many jobs in hospitality and the last few years in pharmaceutical research (closer to my degree). I'm not career oriented at all - I like working for the sense of achievement and to add to domestic budget, but I am also perfectly happy now, just looking after the farm, animals, and general domestic admin.
If we were to move back to the UK it would have to be in a rural/outskirts setting. A house with a garden big enough for our 2 dogs, maybe even some chickens. Clearly in most of the UK such requirement would mean one needs to be on at least 6 figures salary, but Lincolnshire popped up as a relatively affordable place.
My question is: do any of you live in Lincolnshire and could comment on the quality of life there, recommend more specific locations? If we were to move it'd have to be to a place that offers decent choice of activities for kids. They currently do swimming, music lessons and jiujitsu, all of those either in our village or within half an hour drive.
I know that Lincolnshire is known to be more on the conservative side, that suits us fine. What I do want to avoid at all cost is really run down places - visible drug addiction issues, homelesness, petty crime.
I would really greatly appreciate first hand experiences :-)
I'm happy to offer advice on Portuguese living in exchange!

I mainly meant the architecture and in Lincoln's case the Cathedral and Castle.
I have only been there 5 times!

No need to come at Me!

Boston?! Nice?! Bwahahahah. It’s a shit hole. Literally.

It’s my nearest big town. I’m about 20 mins away from there and trust me, you do not want to live in Boston

Boston is a nice place to visit, some nice historical gems and a decent market.

But I wouldn't want to live there.

My view might be skewed due to happy childhood summers there, but I absolutely LOVE Spalding. Still have cousins there. Would move there in a heartbeat if we weren't tied by other family/work commitments.

I was born and raised in Spalding. I live about 20 mins away now. It’s not the worst town and it’s where we do most of our shopping

OP - stay in Portugal. It's beautiful, your children will be bilingual and able to work anywhere in the world, the people are friendly, gentle and welcoming, the weather is (largely!) lovely and there are mountains. And hills. And lakes. And coasts. It's everything Lincolnshire isn't.

Woodhall Spa is lovely - we have a 1920s cinema, a gym with a lido, 2 supermarkets etc. 6 miles to Horncastle where there is a grammar school. People move here from all over the country due to the nearby RAF base - so definitely no ' Little Britain' vibe. 15 minute drive to the beautiful Lincolnshire Wolds.

Thank you for this pointer! Just had a quick look at the properties and it does indeed look rather nice :-)

What a response! I haven't had time for more than reading your replies, they're all amazing, thank you, really appreciated.
The main issues raised here that would be worrying for me as well are the sense of isolation for the young people, and bad roads. I have resigned to being my kids taxi at this point anyway, one of the uglier "perks" of living out of the cities. Looks like closer to a bigger place would be a better idea, like nearby Lincoln, as some suggested.
The "testimonies" of those of you who grew up in the countryside of Lincolnshire really hit it close to home... Although at this point I know I would not want to move back to a city, even if this makes my teen unhappy. Cities are young people game :-) She'll surely move to one when uni time comes... But your heartfelt sentiments made it clear that we should not think about truly remote locations.
The roads quality is not great news either. Thank you for hints of places to avoid too.
The -phobias and -isms I'm not too worried about. As long as they're not acted upon in a truly nasty manner I can take some mean words or looks. A low level xenophobia is quite natural, as long as it's not acted upon, and people tend to open up when they have enough time to get to know each other better.
Our budget would have been up to 400K in the past, prior to the current 6% rates. They really mess things up.
If we were to move it'd probably be to rent to start with anyway.
I'm aware of the flooding issue, went on a few fb pages local to Lincolnshire and it's all they're about. Good to know.
Looks like there is good and bad, as anywhere else. The weather... Where we are now the weather is not loved by my UK born family members. Summers are very hot, so much so that a few weeks mean basically barely surviving, and winters are very very wet - the annual rainfall is the same as in Scotland, but in a few months instead of 12. I'm Ok with that, the rest are struggling sometimes :-)
We have done Scotland, and it is truly a beautiful place, will always miss it and both kids are born there and feel fiercely Scottish. But we are not going back.
I will keep an eye on the responses.
Thank you all.

I don’t think in Lincoln the isolation and roads will be so much of an issue. Our village has an hourly bus service during the day except on Sundays so our teenagers could usually get where they needed to, lots of cycle paths too. Free school buses are provided from the villages as well. Quite a bit on for older children, scouts, cadets etc.
We also have 2 younger children and would say is a brilliant place to bring up young children. They go to a range of clubs, their school is great, really good range of local childcare, GP surgery really good, lots of lovely parks/playgrounds. There’s quite a bit for adults to do. It’s very much a place you can live without spending a fortune. Job wise we’ve not found it difficult to find good work or our teenagers and adult DC, and yes there’s traffic at busy times but easy to get around. Can’t really think of anything we don’t have locally so only really travel to see family.
I’ve lived in quite a few parts of the country including London and although there is truth in the negative things people have said (and mainly apply to outside of Lincoln which is much less diverse and isolated) Lincoln is overall the best place have lived

I like Rutland far more than Lincolnshire, but property is more expensive, and public transport very limited.

Stamford is nice, but is expensive by Lincolnshire standards.

Grantham is bigger, and better connected (road and rail) with good schools. It does have plenty going on (clubs and activities for children). But it's definitely got a rough side (and in the 1980s was voted "the most boring town in Britain")

"GP surgery really good" must be the rarest used sentence in the English language in 2023 😄
All that sounds perfect actually.
Does Lincoln have a lot of rough areas and homelessness/drug abuse issues? Or is it possible to avoid those mostly?
Can you recommend any schools? Got a 7 and a 14 years olds.
Thank you.

And very expensive. Rutland has some of the highest house prices in the country.

Poor old Lincolnshire has taken a bit of a battering on this thread.

Bits of it are awful, but some of it is rather beautiful (although as a PP has said, between October and February, it's mostly mud.) I moved here from London and for two years stumbled around in some sort of advanced culture shock. However, I now rather love the rhythms of rural life and am used to pheasants and deer hurling themselves into the road and gangs of people in tweed with guns and spaniels all over the place. It can be boring for teenagers, but most I know are fine and are into outdooor stuff, like horse riding and dog agility. The market towns have useful amenities for kids, like swimming pools and sports clubs, and villages often have Scouts/Brownies and the like. Some of the schools are truly excellent (oddly, Grantham has some great schools, despite not being somewhere you might want to live). You do have to accept you will do lots of chauffeuring, but surely this is true of having teenagers in many places, other than London, where transport links are a bit shit or you don't want young kids travelling about on their own in the dark. You don't have to engage with the Brexit twats - there are lots of people who aren't racist bigots and plenty of people who read the Guardian, wear hand-knitted jumpers and like to jump about in the woods communing with nature and eating avocados.

You need to have a good look around, OP.

Ha, they’re busy enough but have always managed to get an emergency appointment for me or the children when needed and clean, professional etc which fairly typical for most public services in the area (have lived in a few areas of the country so don’t take this for granted).
There are rough areas of Lincoln, more towards the centre, monks road area, ermine estate, parts of birchwood (although also some lovely people there also) Boultham park etc. Nicer areas are Welton, Saxilby, North Hykeham, the cliff villages, Witham St Hughs, Bassingham, Swinderby, Nettleham to name a few, the newer build villages are more welcoming to newcomers but I’ve know people move from other parts of the country/world to the larger older villages and been very happy. Really lucky that most of the local primaries are really good, a range of secondary schools too from private (Lincoln minster) to coveted academic state (LSST) the comprehensives generally fairly good, e.g Sir Robert Pattison.
Lincoln is a really small city in population terms and made up of a good mix of people who have always lived here and those from outside the area (mainly due to families moving with the RAF who then have decided to stay). I would say it’s the sort of place where even if your buying or selling something on fb you usually find you’ve got at least one mutual friend with the other person and your likely to see at least one person you know whenever you go out, whether it’s to Whisby nature park, the swimming lesson you take your kids to on the other side of the city or a shopping trip! However it’s also big and diverse enough to not be as insular as other parts of Lincolnshire and have most things you could want of a city (ikea and ice rinks excluded) traffic is as you would expect but nothing horrendous and sort of place where people will take turns to let queuing traffic out on roundabouts at rush hour etc. Depending on which side of Lincoln your based, can get to the A1 and also the east coast mainline at Newark in as little as 15 minutes

I live in a village just outside Lincoln and I don't recognise any of the issues around racism/isolation/deprivation that other posters have noted ....maybe in more rural areas . I love it here! Though we do need an IKEA and an ice rink 😁

I also live in a village just outside Lincoln and I’ve never heard any of the racism that has been mentioned upthread.

We live in a small village next to Nettleham. Nettleham and surrounding is beautiful, easy bus links into Lincoln, close to swimming pools, libraries, shops etc. I’d never move, it’s rural but has everything we need.

I’d avoid Lincoln itself as the houses in the nice areas (bailgate/uphill) are expensive and some of the cheaper areas (st Giles/ermine/birchwood) are a bit rough and run down.

Lincolnshire is lovely.

Problem is that once people start looking for -isms and -phobias they're more likely to find them than not. Sadly these terms had lost their value through overuse, in my opinion. I'm definitely not put off the Lincolnshire by associating it with the unpopular terms.
Ice rink would be nice :-)

It looks like Lincolnshire has a lot to offer, and particularly so for a family like ours - looking for more of a traditionally minded communities, peaceful locations, a place slightly "behind" the modern times. Advice on looking closer to a bigger town/city (eg Lincoln) is taken on board and appreciated, it really helps to understand local dynamics better.
I can see that Lincolnshire would not be a good place to people who value big diversity, a choice of cultural events, those who like everything that London has to offer. For us London would have to be the last place on Earth we would choose living in - that's for the perspective ;-)
I really really enjoy reading about your experiences and opinions! Thank you

wow OK reading the messages here is very interesting.

OP I am from South Lincs - born in Spalding! I left more than 30 years ago so that is my caveat, and I hear those on this thread who say my info may be out of date.

But I very much agree with those who say for the love of god do not move to South Lincs with teens.

My life as a teen was grim. We didn't even live in Spalding, but in a village outside. A trip with friends to the cinema needed a bus then a lift from my unwilling dad. The cinema was knocked down years ago and the buses no longer run, so I am not convinced that things have improved tbh.

I've been back there a bit as I had relatives there until about 10 years ago and as far as I could see it was still pretty grim. Under resourced, no decent hospital or shops anywhere near, no leisure facilities to speak of, scenery still not up to much. Population not at all diverse, everyone sits the 11-plus so you are sidelined to a sec mod if you don't pass. There's a reason the property is cheap.

Phew! apols to all the South Lincs lovers for my rant. OP if you can share even a ballpark of your budget we may be able to advise on somewhere (more) suitable. I have to say I would not want to move somewhere like S Lincs without considerable family ties.

I have an ‘Eastern European’ accent (in reality southeastern European, but they all tend to get lumped together), and I was definitely met with hostility in Lincolnshire. Of course you can find people everywhere that share those views, but I found it to be very overt there. I wasn’t looking for it, and I didn’t need to tbh. I was very much treated with at best suspicion (and like an idiot, come to think of it. Quite a few people were quick to assume I was incapable of understanding what they were saying unless they spoke slowly and loudly. I’m fluent in English), and was told to fuck off back to Lithuania/Poland with the rest of my kind more than once. That i’m neither Polish nor Lithuanian went unnoticed apparently.

Thankfully I wasn’t there long at all.

Sorry @dasza79 I see you did post a budget upthread.

It seems to me you are talking about rural Lincs (or even close to Lincoln which is still quite isolaetd imho) and then London - but there are masses of things in the UK in between those two.

No, I don;t want to live in London - but there are many many options which offer a cultural variety - cinemas, theatres, gigs by bands big and small, classical music, museums, sports facilities, activities for kids - which are still not London. But IME they are not rural Lincs either.

Right. How do you quote just partial quote here?! I don't use Mumsnet very often :-)
The idea would be to rent to start with (for up to 1-1.2 K per month), and hopefully see the interest rates go down at some point in the future. The budget would be up to 350K tops, 3 bedrooms and a small garden a must - got 2 large dogs that are used to being mostly outside.
It does look like near Lincoln or North of it is more recommended than south?
Reading through the comments helped me make peace with the idea of moving away from proper countryside in favour of living slightly closer to a town or city. It'd be nice for the kids to have some neighbours they could hang out with.

But you're not from Borgias either? :-) Sorry, love the nickname!
I get what you're saying. I've lived in Scotland for 17 years, my Eastern European accent is here to stay (I am Polish tho, that's my excuse), and for many many years natives both struggled to understand me and assumed I can't speak the language. It was frustrating and isolating. Only forming close relationships changed that.
It's specific to native British and native Americans only, I find. Speaking English with anyone who is not a native speaker has never been an issue, the communication is perfectly easy and comfortable. We visited England recently and I was almost taken aback by the fact I again needed to repeat myself and speak slower.
It helps to have a British family, makes me more "their own" than a stranger.

Ah, if only! Escandaloso

If you’re Polish I would be cautious about Lincolnshire, honestly. There was a lot of immigration from Poland and the Baltics into areas of Lincolnshire, and there was quite the backlash from the locals. It didn’t/doesn’t help that areas of Lincolnshire are very deprived. In my experience the different communities would rarely mix, and there was a lot of tension to the degree that you could feel it, and violence wasn’t unheard of. Even though you have British family you may find it a difficult place to integrate. Ime experience British families from different areas of the UK even struggled, being seen as ‘foreign’ if they didn’t have generations of family from the area.

Based on what you seem to be looking for, I would personally recommend Norfolk or Suffolk over Lincolnshire.