AIBU to think leaving London for a new city is preferable to the suburbs?

[jumpyfrog]

I'm a born & raised Londoner (SW), husband the same (SE). We currently live in SW London & in the catchment of an outstanding school. As my mum is 10 mins walk & inlaws 10 min drive we also have a great support network & have 1 day of childcare plus babysitting provided by them.

However looking to the next few yrs we really would like a bigger property & perhaps try for DC3. 90% of our friends have moved out to either zone 5 (Sutton, Bromley, S.Croydon) or to surrounding counties (Kent, Surrey, Sussex & Essex) & this seems to be the natural step.

AIBU to hate the idea of moving to the suburbs/countryside & thinking moving to another city would be better for me?
I've always lived within 10 mins walk of the high street & the tube & cant stand the idea of driving everywhere. Obviously jobs are an issue but I run a small online business & my husband would still get a decent salary in areas such as Bristol.

Has anyone moved from London to a new city? was it a good decision? where did you go?

@jumpyfrog
I guess you need to ask yourself to what extent you do actually make the most of London and "the big city" as it is.

I think you would find Bristol and Brighton too quiet.
I really like both, but they don’t match, nowhere near what you probably have now.
And the moving away from support seems questionable.

We are quite far out. All the football team teenagers here enjoyed getting on the last possible tube station, in to Wembley.

I think most of them would like to live closer and nip into London more easily, as they get older.

@Oblomov17
I cant speak for Bristol but can for Brighton. Coming from London its also much more cliquey than you would be used to. Theres not as much variety in the types of people you'll meet and you'll find that there tend to be quite clear-cut tribes there: the music crowd, the gay crowd, the hippie woo crowd, the yummy mummy crowd, the +40 middle class weekend drugs crowd and then the huge amounts of homeless people you will encounter. Its interesting really, its a fun place but I find it "stratified".

OP - did you see that house Tatiana linked for Mortlake?

Mortlake is walking distance into Barnes. Thompson School, Barnes Primary and St Mary Magdalene are all outstanding. Most primaries in this area are. White Hart Lane is lovely. ALSO prices are likely to shoot up in Mortlake in the next few years as the Mortlake Brewery is to be converted into a luxury shopping / restaurant complex! This would be on your doorstep. And you are right on the river - you can walk / cycle all the way down to Kingston and beyond. It's about 10 mins to Clapham Junction on the train (if that).

I don't live in Mortlake - but I don't think you can lose buying there.

I would move to Bristol in a heartbeat if I left London but it's nearly as bloody expensive now! Ridiculous considering the wages aren't remotely comparable. My DH earns 85k in London. He would earn 35 in Bristol.

Mother in law moved from London to Bath. I thought it was lovely. I also sometimes regret that we didn't move to Kingston, rather than into a suburb.

That said, the suburb is changing, the schools are good, hospitals are good, transport is good, and it is very easy to find interesting things, all the time.

My DH earns 85k in London. He would earn 35 in Bristol

We got the equivalent of ‘London weighting’ when we lived in Bristol as our employer realised the prices were almost as high!

Somewhere like Chelmsford has a lot going on and is only a short train ride into London. You could get a great house in your budget too.

Looking at jobs DH would get less in Bristol but there are plenty advertised for what he does at 50-60k & we have a fair bit of equity.

Parisa Re Mortkake I never consideeed there & I do quite like it. Is there much aircraft noise?

Just bumped into my neighbours on the nursery run who are moving, they are going to Bristol!!

I’d live in Kingston or Twickenham or Hampton, if I could afford to. Or Wimbledon.
List could go on and on ......

Agree with isolation re Brighton.

Well if your neighbour is going maybe this is a hint / fate?

personally I probably wouldn’t live in Clifton again.whilst it was absolutely lovely it’s probably a bit too quiet and twee for you.

I’m sure we can all help you with exciting house hunting - that’s the fun bit - once you’ve decided on an area within Bristol that you want to live .......

Oblomov Wimbledon is my fave place, biased as I went to school there. Love the villiage & the mix of high street & independents on the high street & good nightlife. And good fashion shops. I remember a friends parents bought a house in the villiage about 12 yrs ago for around 900k (still loads) & sold it for over 3.5 mill last yr.

Any MNs want to move in with me? how about £250 rent pcm plus some babysitting.

www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-61807267.html

I’ll come and live with you with my DH and 2 DD’s... you won’t even know we’re there

Let's just give the kids their own wing & leave them to it!

I always think Bristol is a bit grubby and driving around there you take your life in your hands people seem to change lanes in a sense of happy abandonment you don't see in other places. But I'm a country girl at heart so I am probably seeing it from a different perspective.

raised, putup and idina: so glad to hear positive feedback from Norwich! It’ll be Nearly 3 more years before we take the plunge (in time for DC1 to start secondary school and when our youngest will be eligible for the 30 hours funding).

Do you have any recommendations for family areas? Near the city centre, good secondary and primary schools around, childcare facilities etc? Our budget probably won’t be much more than £300k and I’ll need to be able to commute for work (an accounts job I hopefully get somewhere!) thank you!

You can still get a house in Southfields at a pinch for 850.

This one is a mess but potentially good. You can do the side return to create a big kitchen/ family room. Then you’d be v near Wimbledon.

The ‘Mortlake’ house is technically Sheen. It’s just off Sheen Lane. The worst of the planes are Richmond and Kew - I couldn’t live in either despite Richmond being beautiful, and I know people who’ve moved from both to get away from them. I think they’re fine in Sheen - roughly the same as where I am.

I’m not sure how it took someone so long to get back from the British Museum. Tottenham Court Road - Waterloo 10 mins, Waterloo - Wandsworth Town/Earlsfield 15 mins. It should be 30-40 mins max.

we have looked a little around the Streatham & surrounding areas about 9 months ago. But we struggled to find 2000 sq ft homes in excellent catchments

Fair enough, I wasn't taking catchments into account. But prices have come down a hell of a lot since 9 months ago (and selling prices are even lower than asking prices). Still expensive and I agree about brexit etc but that applies to other cities too especially the naice bits you're wanting.

I'd probably look more at SE London or Kingston and surrounds rather than Streatham anyway.

We aren't from London but it was where we ended up for work when our oldest children were young. I grew up rurally and my DH in the suburbs, which neither of us wanted to return to for at least 30 years.
We first moved to Bristol for a few years and then work took us to Manchester. We love both but prefer Manchester and we have managed to buy a lovely house up here in a decent area with a really great community and a short commute.

Your right minipie prices certainly coming down. Tbh when a 2 bed flat in Mitcham is 500k something not right!

I feel for what we could afford in Streatham/Tooting etc it would probably only do us for 5-6 yrs whereas something further out with more space could work for a lot longer & hopefully Brexit would be sorted then?

One thing we do have to research is DH career progression as we are both early 30s so we will be toiling away for yrs to come.

Thorpe has a great secondary school and primary schools and was in our price bracket (same as yours) when we moved 2 years ago. But the houses were almost being sold from under us wherever we looked so I suspect prices might have gone up! Eaton is nice but again pricy! We are on the outskirts of Sprowston which I love but apparently there are some not nice areas. I haven't seen anything terrible, but I do have to laugh when people describe the less salubrious areas of Norwich. They'd have an attack of the vapours if they saw where we'd moved from, so I suppose its all about perception.

Tottenham court road to waterloo is a lot longer than 10 mins and train times can mean lots of waiting around, so a journey that on paper doesn’t look too bad can be much longer in practice.

I disagree with the poster who says much depends on how much you access what London has to offer. Jobs is the key thing IMO.

If your plan is to continue to work in London then commuting time is a massive factor.

If your plan is to get a job elsewhere that’s different, but depending ob your field there are far fewer well paid jobs elsewhere.