AIBU to ask is there life after London?

[poppingshop1]

I know there is, but is it a good one?

DH & I are true Londoners & live in a lovely part of SW London that I grew up in. We have a lovely life, mum around the corner, excellent school which DC1 attends around the other corner, lovely neighbours, etc. BUT we are starting to think we should leave. 90% of our childhood friends have moved out to either zone 5/6 or the home counties. 3 of my close friends (met through NCT) who live nearby have all decided to leave & told me this week.

We want more space (property is 1300 sq ft) which we can’t afford unless we move to other parts of London (don’t really see the point) & husband is finding the tube more & more stressful. Plus the general hustle & bustle is starting to grate.

However the idea of moving to the suburbs terrify me (don’t mean to offend), worried I will be bored/lonely & DH might struggle with the commute as he’s used to 30 mins door to door. I’d prefer to live in a 3/4 bed terrace close to amenities than a 6 bed detached in the middle of nowhere.

My 3 NCT friends are moving to other cities (Bristol, Edinburgh & Bath) & I’m starting to think that moving to another city could be a great option.

I’m lucky that I freelance so 90% of my work is wfh. DH would obviously earn less working in another city but still plenty of finance jobs around at the 70k mark and as we have at least 500k equity our cost of living would ideally be lower, I feel we might have a better quality of life. My mum is likely to move to be closer to us (she’s an immigrant, so no other family here).

Has anyone moved from London to other cities? Did you regret it? How hard did you find it settle? Where would you go?

That TACT isn't your thing^

Op you mention your parents being immigrants so I would just bear in mind that if you wanted like communities with similar backgrounds then you would need to look carefully at this in the hunt for a new home. In particular bear in mind that the wide diversity of ethnicities and backgrounds that is par for the course and unremarkable in London is not necessarily going to be present in other places. Bluntly if you are not white and don’t want to stick out, pick carefully is what I’m saying.

I'm sure there are parts of Manchester, Birmingham, etc. that are multicultural and have 24-hour opening in the same way, but on the whole the UK is not like that and it's just disingenuous to pretend that it is.

So every shop in London is open 24/7?

I live in a small town. Most of the corner shops are open until 10 or 11. The supermarkets are open 24 hours.
It is equally disingenuous to claim that the big cities are the only places where you find a shop open after 5

Leeds especially, even the city center and vibrant areas of Headingly and Chapel A it used to be impossible trying to get some food out in a restaurant 10pm. No so in London.

Large supermarkets closed at 4pm on a Sunday. At least in london they have the decency to open 11-5 not 10- bloody-4.

Compared to living anywhere else in London it IS a tiny mortgage. Because it's not on a £1.2m house. Because houses around here are cheaper. I'm not saying it was tiny for us, I'm saying it's tiny compared to people who live in (for example) SW London, which is far less affordable.

This is not a discussion about the fairness of people being able to afford to buy where they grew up or otherwise. This was a conversation about how people have made living elsewhere in London or outside of London work for them. There are a million other threads to discuss the relative inequalities and inequities of the housing market, both in and out of the capital. I'm sorry you felt my response was tactless.

Wow, this thread escalated since I posted early doors...

So, you live SW17/SW12 OP?

Gotta say, I quite miss that area (not the traffic) lived in furzedown village about 10 years ago, moved to zone1 (SE1/11) now 10 miles or so outside of the M25 - on the southern rail network.
Thankfully I don't have to get the train to commute as I work shifts so rely on my car.

I love the house we have now, and have made some great friends/neighbours but I do miss London so very much and we're not that far away.

Don't move if you don't have to!

Most big supermarkets in Scotland don't close at all.

Only on Christmas day.

Otherwise 24/7.

One of the advantages of living somewhere where people come from a huge variety of backgrounds is that religious/cultural holidays are different so something's always open.

Yes I agree. Like my city.

As well as the shops mentioned above, I have Indian, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, etc. grocery shops within easy walking distance and selling weird and wonderful fruit, veg and groceries that you can't get even in the biggest supermarkets.

Yup, here in my ‘provincial’ town too.

Bizarrely I have seen positive discrimination exist towards people of different ethnic backgrounds.
I live in a city where racial harmony is good, I have seen friends and colleagues use their ethnic heritage to great effect.

My folks live in a tiny village, only 100 people.
There are two Indian and one black family.
I’m not saying for one moment that there aren’t bits of the country that are racist, see Brexit, however it cannot be claimed that London has the monopoly on racial diversity.

Battleax
And I was just suggesting some tact about "tiny" mortgages and "this is home" and so on at a time when very many people are leaving.

Seriously you thought this poster was being offensive. Your reaching!

FrankiesKnuckle yep SW12/11.

the idea of being somewhere where the number of black and Indian families can be counted on one hand is really disturbing. Even if the overall population is also tiny

I can tell you who everyone in the village is. What you have a problem with there is village life. There is a gay couple too.

geneverbut the idea of being somewhere where the number of black and Indian families can be counted on one hand is really disturbing.

Why is that disturbing?

It's just the way it is sometimes. I have spent the past 17 years living in a rural location, in a village with 900 population.

There were no black or Asian families living there. The people who lived there were not racist, they were tolerant and open.

My DD goes to a large state secondary school, there are possibly 10 non white pupils out of 800.

I really don't get why you are disturbed by that.

I’m white, DH is mixed but looks mediterranean. In France strangers will talk French to him but always assume I’m english, bloody pale skin!

I have noticed over the years that the areas I grew up in are becoming less diverse which does make me a little uncomfortable.

You are assuming that racism is a big problem here.

It isn't.

What should we do? Ship bus loads of people from other ethnic origins and force them to live here?

Obviously please do correct me if this is a wrong assumption, but I don't think it's about racism or people being racist. It's about being 'other'. No matter how accepting or inclusive any community is, if you're one of the only black/Chinese/Pakistani children or families in that community, you would still be defined by your skin colour or ethnic background because it would be how people refer to you, and it enforces the sense of otherness. I could well understand why people wouldn't want to live like that.