Can the last poor* person to leave London please take their kids with them.

[fakenamefornow]

WTAF is going on with house prices? I want to move to London but it seems impossible.

I think Surrey's going to be next to remove all traces of the poor.

• By poor I mean anyone on average income or below, so actually, just not rich.

I want to move to London but it seems impossible

Trust me, you don't.

Aside from the fact that I don't understand your post at all, the high houseing costs in London is not recent at all.
House prices have been prohibitively high in London for a very long time, well over a decade.

Many high earners can't afford it either.

Trust me, you don't

Why not?

Yes, why not?

We can't afford it. I grew up there and i have had to move away from my family and friends and DH has to pay £400 to commute in. When DH got £60k per annum we thought it was rock'n'roll money. Sadly it isn't anywhere near enough. But having said that we do much prefer where we live now/are moving to.

London has been for a while (as in, last 10 years or so) - a place for the very rich, the poor who get assistance to pay their rent/social housing, and the middle class young (who can afford to rent small flats for stupid money, but have to move out of London if they want space when they start a family of their own) - the only 'normal' middle income types I know living in London have been there for a loooonnnng time so benefitted from rising house prices, or those who sadly inherited a lump youngish (in their 20s) so could buy a normal sized house - but in those cases it involved someone very close to them dying before their time, and I quite frankly would rather live outside the M25 and my DCs have all 4 grandparents and uncles alive.

Where in London do you need to get to? Work out where the nearest 'big' train station is and work down the line. You'll find places you can afford are full of people just like you, I'm in Kent and it's full of young families saying things like "well, we had a lovely top floor flat in South East London, but we could get a 3 bed house with a garden for the same money here..."

Totally agree Mary. We are in Kent too and everyone at the toddler groups lived in flats in London then moved out here when they had their dc.

My DH works in London Bridge and based on advice from MNers we followed the line out to Kent and are now buying in Tonbridge (fingers crossed).

marywest has it.

London is for the rich and the poor. And the young who will share/slum it.

Years ago DH and I bought a flat very centrally. It wasn't cheap, but we could afford it as two late twenties professionals. The block was full of people like us.

We've recently started living there again during the week sometimes (having rented it out for almost two decades) and the block is now full of extremely rich people...

I disagree that London's not affordable - DH and I have bought a 3-bed flat in zone 3, admittedly with no garden but it cost c.£250k and is in a lovely area. And we don't earn ridiculous amounts, we're public sector.

DamnBamboo
House prices have risen by something like 17% in London in the last year alone. No other part of the country is suffering anything like this kind of house price inflation.

I agree that London is for the very wealthy or those who are willing to live in tiny spaces with no gardens.

It is an utter shame.

We couldn't afford £250k Sybil and DH earns £60k.

Sybil - most families couldn't get a mortgage for a quarter of a million pounds on an average income, with the return to 3.5x salary limits. They'd need a stinking huge deposit upfront.

It is getting silly here, I bought with DH in South East London in 2008, and we would not be able to afford to buy our house now. We have neighbours who bought for a pittance 30 years ago, when it was a much less nice area who have been amazed at how prices have gone (but it is a much nicer area now...).

It's hard to define rich, we are not bankers with big bonuses, but by most of the country standard I think we would be considered rich, despite feeling very squeezed middle!

The average house in London is still going up in value by a thousand a month. It's a bubble and the government/bank of England are in denial. London is pulling away from the rest of the country like a steam train and soon there'll be no young talented creative people around any more. London will become like Dubai. A city for the rich and largely middle aged.

Brighton's heading the same way. Young interesting families can't afford to live here so they're all moving out to Worthing. Commuters from London are buying all the houses, putting up the prices beyond those one can afford on a Brightonian wage. It's a worry.

We couldn't afford £250k Sybil and DH earns £60k

You should be able to if you've been saving for a deposit.

10% deposit £25k
Plus
4 x £60 = £240k

I agree with you that house prices are crazy, especially in London. I'd love to move back there at some point but I can't see it ever happening because of the cost of housing.

There are plenty of poor people in London though, they are just lucky enough to have social housing, and sometimes housing benefit as well.

You live where you can afford to live. It has ever been thus. If you can't afford to live in London, don't. We live outside London (having lived there for seven years) and you couldn't pay me to go back. Yes, it has wonderful shops, restaurants, museums and lots of jobs, but its very easy to take advantage of those things while living elsewhere.

Super rich or super poor (or expats on a stonking package). That's the trick!

Well the house we have just bought is £220k with a £30k deposit, the monthly payments are £1200 a month. which atm is all we can stretch to. However that is based on £400 fares and no car. So i suppose we'd only need ? £150-£200 fares so would be better off by £250? a month. Not sure if that would cover the extra mortgage? Also remember the cost of moving - £250k would be 3% SD and then the fees so at the best way another £6k?

Two higher rate tax payers here and (mainly due to bad timing re housing market) and despite decent deposit we had to resort to shared ownership to stay in London.

I'm regretting it TBH. We've made some money on our owned share but we are paying crazy money on rent on the rest, still being clobbered by spiralling living costs and meanwhile the soul really is being sucked out of London. Before my eyes.

Realistically now, because of DCs education we are stuck for another six years

Why do you want to move to London fake?

I don't think you can move in, yes unless on very high salary. I have lots of friends that don't earn loads, and some that do, but the ones that don't just bought their houses years ago as others have said.

But moving in, too hard. You need that equity unless you have that very high salary.

Also Whois, your calculations are based on someone accepting a 10% deposit. A few people we approached said they would only lend £180k based on DHs income - that's possibly different if there were 2 earners, i'm not sure? We found lots of people advertising 10% deposits and repayments of £900 a month on a loan of £200k but then when we actually applied the lowest we found on £190k was £1200. So i don't know what it would be on £225k. We also had to pay an extra £1k for the mortgage to be fixed at a rate we could afford without me working.

And if people have been renting already in the SE, the chances are they have not been able to save a big deposit as have been paying a lot in rent and council tax (rent on our 2 bed flat is £1300 and the CT is £240 a month )

I think it's shame as London is going to become a transient place where people can't afford to settle.

Yes, London is really bloody expensive BUT it is full of people on average wages - they just dont all live in lovely 'family' homes with gardens.

Most of the families I know live in rented or mortgaged flats. There IS an in between to poshos in Hampstead or people living on benefits in deprived housing estates.

They have a decent quality of life, but their expectations are different. I think people from outside of London expect that once you're married with kids you should be living in a 4 bed semi with a garden. Hence why a lot of non-Londoners leave London again when they start a family, as they cant afford the ideal they grew up with (thats when you get all the 'i could never raise kids in london' stuff coming out).

Most Londoners realise that the white picket fence lifestyle ain't gonna happen unless you're well off.

I'm not defending the silly prices here, btw. Its bollocks.