To think I can manage a 1hr 50 min commute each way

[Lucyannieamy]

Hi
I currently have a 35-45min commute from London zone 3 in. We are seriously looking at moving out, but need some views on whether the commute would be a killer.
Looks like it'd be leave home about 7am for a 7.30 train, 50 min into London, 25mins across London to get into the office on time. Way home is a little quicker train so if I left at 5 I should get home about 6.45

Kids are 7&4 and DH would work local.

Is it worth it to get out of London?

Ok, definitely getting the message that it is pretty awful, even from those of you who are doing it.

We were hoping to get out of London for clean air, and a village more like where we grew up, nearer to the family. London air is dirty, it's busy, our neighbours are too close, feel like we have no privacy. We rarely socialise 'in town' and trips to theatre, concerts, galleries are so rare as to be doable as a day trip back in at the weekend. I don't generally socialise with work now so I don't think I'm making much of the luxury of London living. At weekends we see local friends, do stuff in the garden. We want a bigger garden particularly, so moving just a little way further out wouldn't give us that at any affordable price, hence ending at the 50min train.

Maybe doable for a couple of years to pay off the cost of the move then time to find something more local

I do it - my commute door to door is just under 2 hours, with a 1:30 hr journey in the middle.
It's fine to be honest. I have various hobbies - knitting, crochet etc that I do on the train. That makes me feel like I'm not actually wasting 3-4 hours a day.
I get home around 8 most evenings and leave the house by 7:15. I do have a DH who can do all of the kid stuff though - it wouldn't be doable otherwise.
One thing I would say, is are your set hours always always 9-5? I do get rather shafted if I have to stay late at work as my trains become much less regular.

Sorry, just to add: I would absolutely hate living in London, the crowds, noise, pollution, crime, traffic etc etc would drive me round the bend.
Living so far away means I'm really in the sticks. Coming home to our little village to me is such a calming experience (sometimes verging on the religious!), and you very definitely feel like you're miles from work which is lovely.

I really can't understand why people do this.

Or dare I say it's a gender thing, it's ok for the man to commute to the money job in the city but not me?

Most men, in my experience, who have high paid money jobs either have wives who stay home/work part time, or a housekeeper. They don't come in from a 12 hour day and start on the washing up and they are not there for the bedtime routine (sometimes on purpose).

My husband commuted weekly for years, it exhausted him and made his health conditions worse, it was just too much stress, overcrowded trains (sometimes standing for hours), five years was enough for him.

For a time limited amount of time, and with a supportive partner who is genuinely able to pick up all the slack of cooking, cleaning and childcare for 12 hours a day, it could work if it were essential say for promotion/vastly increased salary, but as a choice for 'quality of life' reasons, I'm not getting it.

I did pretty much exactly this for about 5 years, it is indeed a killer. Firstly you can't guarantee a seat even at that time, and then there's the days when the trains are disrupted.

Can you give us an indication of where you are moving to?

There was a study that showed that you would have to pay someone an extra $40k for an hours extra commute to make them as happy. Village life better be extremely good to make up for the commute.

Op - that sounds like a great plan. It's basically what we're doing and I'm so glad we have done it. In the future the commute will reduce as I'll get a job more locally. But actually I quite enjoy the journey. It's s bit of time to sit and think, plan work projects/think through issues. And when else do you get that time! But would not want to do it forever. I also like being in the buzz of London for some time in the week. But in terms of a family home- glad we have moved out of London.
Your plan sounds good. Good luck!

milleniumhandandprawn I do like the idea of knitting on the train!

DH does most of the child care now, and I've just eaten a lovely dinner he cooked so no worries there. He's not great with mornings thou to be fair, but kids are getting a bit older now and might become more helpful

But Sevenoaks to Charing Cross is 37 minutes, for example. And has idyllic villages all around.

Does it have to be such a long commute?

Think very carefully.

I commute two days a week, I leave home on "office days" at 6.15 (in bed by 9.15pm the night before, asleep by 10.15 as up at 5am).

I have a 45 min walk to station (no buses run this early). Train departs at 7.10, arrives London at 08.56 and I still have another 20 or so minute bus journey (sometimes shorter) to the office. I leave at 5pm. I get home at nearly 8pm.

This is two days a week.

I work from home (thank you God Almighty) the other three.

I'm 53 in August, just those two days knacker me, more in the winter, it's fine in the summer.

My DD is now 13 but we used to live in SE London and moved here, now nearly mortgage free.....albeit we can never move back of course.

That said.....we live in a lovely 3 bed house, huge garden, in Kent. Very nice houses this way for under 300k. PM me if you want more info.

There is no fucking way on earth I would consider that! What a waste of life. My personal rule is if anything is more than 2 hours away I stay over. It will kill your soul.

Have you considered what would happen if there were delays, or strikes, or something meant your train wasn't running?

Why would you want to put yourself through four HOURS of commuting a day? That's a huge amount of wasted time, especially if you're stuck on commuter lines where you can't sit down. It's not like you're guaranteed a seat so you can sit and work/read/knit.

I can't imagine it would be much fun in the summer when you're stuck on a hot, sticky tube, standing-room only, then on a train, standing-room only with no air-con or anything, for two hours straight, twice a day.

ohhhhh - quite a long commute op, and london trains are notoriously untrustworthy - can work compromise? - lets say you work from home one or two days? we have people in team that live in somerset who work two days a week from home as they travel into london.

I have a 90 minute commute each way. Mostly it's fine, today it's been awful. Due to train delays I had a packed train and got to work in 2.5 hours this morning and nearly the same to return. If you are prepared and have childcare coverage for delays that helps make it less stressful. The money is better for my role in London but we chose to live further out for quality of life for the kids. It's hard though.

I couldn't even do this for one week.

Could you try it out for a week and see how wrecked you will be?

Life is to short to spend 20 hours a week commuting. Thats 43 entire days a year, travelling to work.

Hi OP, it is basically what I do and I don't mind it. I am also a single parent of a 3 yr old.

I leave the house at 7.25, cycle to nursery, cycle to the station, get on the train for 45 mins and then, depending on which office I am working in, either walk for 25 mins or tube for 30 mins and a 5 min walk to get in. This gets me in between 9.05-9.15 depending on which office I go to. The return journey is an absolute as I have to be at nursery by 6.30, but the train is a non stopper so it normally only takes 1h30-1h45.

I can sit on the train and work/read my kindle and, to be honest, it is some of the only time I get to myself!

I have a well paid job that I could do elsewhere but not for the same money with the same flexibility. I work from home most Fridays (don't remember the last time I went in to the office) and I'm lucky that my son is still at nursery, it will be harder when he goes to school but I am currently investigating an au pair, albeit that I have 15 months until then.

It is stressful when it goes wrong but my sister lives close by and helps me when I need her to. I also find the trains are just casually late, just 10 mins or so which is not enough to delay repay and I can still make it to nursery but it is frequently coupled with no information - twitter is your friend in those circumstances.

I would say everyone is different and I love my job and love my son, I am a better parent for enjoying my work and we can afford to do the things that we wouldn't be able to do if I worked closer to home.

Dont recommend it. Before kids I commuted from Grantham to London daily, 2 hours each way. No drinks after work as I had to get same train each day, lots of delays/cancellations, I had time to eat shower and then get to bed. That's it Monday to Friday! Not a great quality of life but if you love your job, get paid well and your dh will be there for the kids....

I have a job where my commute varies massively. I also have a long term health condition and generally commute by car (which has both pluses and minuses but is more tiring than by train, but cheaper).

The difference to my health, the state of the house, my work life balance, between a commute that's under 45mins and over an hour is extraordinary.

I don't have a husband to have dinner ready for me when I get home, or to deal with the cleaning or whatever. If I did, and I could really genuinely work 9-5, and the train lines were reliable and I was likely to get a seat, then I think I could do that commute. But it would still really be a case of up, train, work, train, eat, shower, sleep, repeat. I wouldn't like to be around for that little of family life though.

TBH I'd probably take a big pay cut to get rid of my commute. I'm firmly of the belief that you need enough money not to constantly worry but that beyond that time tends to be more important. But I'm naturally frugal and so my perspective may well be different from yours.

I'd deffo think if there was anywhere you could move either to a) be able to walk to a station or b) walk to work from the mainline station and/or c) make the house prices such that you could do it for a year or two, pay the mortgage down like crazy and then afford to give it up for something local if you hated it.

My commute is about an hour and 15 minutes, it's 10 minutes to station 40 minute train walk for 10 minutes or 1 stop on tube and 15 minutes on DLR. in the morning it's lovely and relaxed I catch a train at 6.40 and I generally don't have to sit next to anyone. On the way home it's a bit grim though. Tonight there was a signal failure and trains were being cancelled so mine was absolutely packed and boiling hot. DS is at university so there isn't anyone waiting at home and there are not as many chores to do as it's just me and DH now. The big plus point is if the trains are really messed up because DH works in London as well we can just go and have a drink till everything is fixed. The downside is it's just knackering in the winter.

Or dare I say it's a gender thing, it's ok for the man to commute to the money job in the city but not me?

I don't understand what gender has to do with it, frankly.

But you sound like you have made your mind up, so maybe this thread has helped you.

DH and both did it for 8 year, and DH still does it now (I now work locally).

It fairly quickly becomes the norm, and I forgot about evenings because I became used to by having them! You kind of stop being tired because the commute becomes so mundane and normal.

However, we really loved the house we moved to. It would have been heartbreaking to work so hard and lose weekday evenings if the house/location were just meh. It is a sacrifice, so you have to really benefit from the non-working life to compensate.

Also, the locally working parent will end up doing 80% of the childcare and 'home' effort. I don't care whether that person is male or female, but they need to be on board with the fact that they'll do so much more at home, while you sit on the train and either get ahead with tomorrow's emails or surf the internet. If the locally based person is hesitant then don't do it!

DH did 90 minutes each way so was out the house from around 630-830. One day he came home and said, "Life's too short for this shit" so we moved. We're all a lot happier. He's around more, has time to exercise and do stuff that isn't work related and looks about 10 years younger as a result.

And I no longer worry he's going to die prematurely because he was living in a hamster wheel.

I did a 1 hr 50 commute each way to London when I was in my 20's - no kids, no responsibilities.

It was horrendous, I regularly fell asleep on the train both ways. I lasted a year and it was one of the worst times of my life!