to think a lot of people just don't get the cost of housing?

[stressedofnorthlondon]

DH and I are looking for a house and it's got me thinking. I live in a cheap part of the city, but that's cheap relative to other parts of London and the south east. We've looked a quite a few places now, but with each one I see I just can't quite believe how much a fairly small family house is going to cost us. But, we have completely grown out of our current home so we need to move.

We need to stay in London for lots of reasons. Our jobs are here. I could probably get work elsewhere (or maybe not in the current climate?) but DH couldn't. His profession is London-based. So if we moved away he'd have to commute back in anyway. Our support network is here. Our familes are not but they live in equally expensive areas that are not to far away, close enough to help. All our friends and all that we know, that keeps us sane, are here.

So often on here you see people say "downsize" "move somewhere cheaper" etc etc. The whole HB furore going on at the moment is due to the expectation that people should be moving to cheaper accomodation / cheaper areas. But there is nowhere within commuting distance of London that is cheap! I think it's because people who live in other parts of the country just don't understand that here there isn't really such a thing as "affordable" housing. There isn't anywhere to downsize to, as even small properties, to rent and to buy, are really really expensive. Yes lots of people get paid much higher salaries to work in the capital, but we also have lots of people on minimum wage, lots of people in the service industries, people who clean etc. To rent a family house here is well over £1000 pcm.

So AIBU to think that a lot of people who live elsewhere in the country just don;t understand that housing here is expensive, whatever size of property, or what area you live in.

(and I know that DH and I could stay in our small flat, but we are lucky that we can afford to move, I just can't believe how much it'll cost us!)

Too kind dearjane too kind.

I am also puzzled what jobs the OP and her husband have that can only be done in London?

Are they a Pearly King and Queen? Chas and Dave? or maybe the run a jellied eel stall?

Spoon players like the rest of us, I shouldn't wonder.

Most people are having to pay housing costs of one sort or another, aren't they? It would be very hard indeed not to "get" what's leaving our bank accounts every month. When did it come as a surprise to you?

YABU to be so patronising.

YANBU to think living costs are high - property may cost slightly less further north but people also get paid less.

I have gone back to shoplifting my make-up.

I understand housing varies all over the country and bigger cities especially london must be sky high , Its really difficult for a lot of people to get mortgages raise deposits for even a modest house , I know we are struggiling and the prices where i am will be nowhere near london prices , yanbu

London Prices blah..blah...blah We are so hard done to blah blah blah. The rest of the country doesn't understand blah blah blah.

They are expensive for a reason, lots of people want to live in London because there are more work opportunities and higher wages. So can more readily afford these inflated prices.

Accommodation here in Liverpool is comparatively cheap. You can buy 2 bed houses for £50k (it will be a burnt out shell next to a crack den, but nevertheless)

But then again two thirds of women employed in Liverpool are on the minimum wage, so there isn't a lot of cash floating around. So if you want cheap housing and think working in Poundland for six quid an hour is a better bet, give the Liverpool branch of Pickfords a ring.

The point, however, is that if a woman (or a man) is a teacher, a doctor, a nurse, a fireman, a policeman, a head teacher, an environmental health officer, a social worker, a pharmacist, etc., they will have a vastly better quality of life in Liverpool than in London. The difficulty of course is that London also needs high quality essential services.

I might be wrong, but I thought prices relative to earnings were higher in London than elsewhere? I sympathise with posters complaining about London-centrism, but those of us in the rest of the country are affected by the sky high south eastern rents too. For example the housing benefit bill ends up being more expensive to the taxpayer, wherever that taxpayer is living.

Don't they have key worker housing schemes in London for teachers and firemen and whatnot?

Some. Not really enough for everyone, and no real use to the many workers who are paid less than teachers and firemen.

Average pay scale for a secondary teacher is £32,000 plus about £3k London weighting, for example. It can take a long time to travel not very far across London. Teacher might live in Peckham, South East London. To teach in, say Fulham, that's probably and hour's journey minimum and a minimum of one bus and one tube.

Average price of a 2 bed flat in Peckham is £235,000, average price of a two bed flat in Liverpool City Centre is £156,000.

£32,000 x 3 = £96,000 available for a mortgage
£35,000 x 3 = £105,000 available for a mortgage

The distance to get on the ladder is much greater for key workers in London and their quality of life far worse in the context of travel and location. Unfortunately, key worker properties don't really solve the problem and doesn't necessarily leave London with the best key workers either so it's a very vicious circle.

I've not been to London for 18 years, I thought it was a rip off then. £5 for the cinema and crazily expensive cafés. I wouldn't want to live there if I was a billionaire, far too many people. I totally get how expensive it is.

Saying that, most big city people would hate where we live, we have one clothes shop in town and it's perfectly acceptable never to wear make up here.

FWIW No 17 mascara is great at £2.99...

If London teachers/nurses etc. Feel hard done to in London...they have the freedom to fuck off anywhere in the country. If they don't want to move out of London, fair dos but for fox's sakess stop moaning!

The talk of comparatively well paid professional workers is misleading, as in Northern cities such as Liverpool, they are a minority.

YABU to expect people who don't live anywhere near London to know much about house prices in all the various neighbourhoods there. I don't know about house prices in most of the uk's towns and cities except the ones where I live or friends/family live. No-one expects me to, and why should I!?

I love London, would love to live there, but can't afford to. There are many advantages to living there that you have but we don't. It's the cultural capital, the best restaurants, museums, shows, sports, etc are there. The downside is the cost.

At the end of the day you do have a choice. It may not be an easy one, but no sympathy from me I'm afraid.

Where can you rent a family house for £1000 pcm in London?! We are renting a small 2-bed flat for £1200 in North London. £1000 pcm for a house would be cheap...