Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

If you had a second home, have you or would you go to it ?

235 replies

Lardlizard · 09/04/2020 09:54

?

OP posts:
AnnUumellemahaye · 09/04/2020 12:13

Most rural GPs are not taking temporary residents at the moment. They are stretched at the best of times in the summer months, due to tourists needing emergency care, and their argument is no one should be in a temporary address right now.

People are told not to go to any GP with symptoms of Covid 19, not even their regular one. They deal with it at home and call an ambulance if it gets serious. That would apply wherever they were.

Where are they most likely to get it, baed on the figures so far - the wilds of rural France/Cornwall/Norfolk, or urban and suburban Croydon/Birmingam/London?

Let's not forget that the vast majority do not need hospital admission.

Rachie1973 · 09/04/2020 12:14

I would lol. I have a home in Norfolk to retire to, but my daughter rents it right now.

I’d love to go, in the middle of nowhere. I could take my freezer and not leave the house for a month lol

Sadly, I’m a key worker so just a lovely pipe dream

turquoisedoor · 09/04/2020 12:15

It's also a family with kids. Are local doctors refusing to register children?

countrygirl99 · 09/04/2020 12:15

There are 2 sides to the 2nd home greed debate. The houses that were bought for more than a local buyer can afford was originally sold by a local for more than they could get selling to another local. And no, I don't have and never will have a 2nd home.

WhatWouldYouDoWhatWouldJesusDo · 09/04/2020 12:16

turquoisedoor

I don't think it's sinking in. This is what we have, it's literally as good as it gets. We dont even have a pillow, never mind thousands of ventilators.

The reality of freedom of movement would mean 10s of thousands of people either dying because our 8 ICU beds don't stretch that far or being airlifted elsewhere.

And we've already had people dying as an indirect result of people not being able to access treatment in bigger hospitals. My brother in law's friend died because our hospital doesn't offer something as basic as dialysis. The nearest place that does is Preston and the couldn't accept him.

They had to tell him he.couldnt have his usual treatment that he'd had previously and.had worked and then that was it for him. Lights out at the grand old age of 42.

WhatWouldYouDoWhatWouldJesusDo · 09/04/2020 12:18

And this is a lake District nightingale hospital in all its glory.

I mean honestly. If fear of ending up on an army issue cot for weeks isn't enough to make people stay away then I don't know what is.

If you had a second home, have you or would you go to it ?
nanbread · 09/04/2020 12:18

Giles Coren has been going between the two, then having the gall to make smug #stayhome tweets.

ThinkAboutItTomorrow · 09/04/2020 12:19

No, i thought about it just before lockdown but I wouldn't have wanted to spread the virus. I live in London and travelled a fair bit round Europe with a colleague who almost certainly had it (after we travelled). I think it's likely I was infected but a symptomatic just before lockdown.

Also one house is in Italy so no way I'm going there. The other is in an area of the UK that is great to get out and about but not such fun to be stuck mostly indoors with kids. Their toys are at home, easier to keep them entertained here.

If I didn't have kids I would have been quite tempted though.

turquoisedoor · 09/04/2020 12:19

I'm very sorry to hear about your bil's friend. I'd hate to think things are getting as bad where you are they've been in cities for a while. Sadly that's not an unusual occurrence in densely populated cities. I'm not calling for lockdown rules to be flouted. I'm lint

turquoisedoor · 09/04/2020 12:26

Phone went funny. I was simply pointing out double standards from some rural folk. It's the cities that need the beds, the ventilators, the hospitals, because they're the ones suffering with Covid. Lockdown was put in place in time to go some way towards protecting rural areas, where everyone's safer in the first place because they're more spaced out. Most people in London too have to travel for hospital treatment. Most don't live in central London. They also share the London hospitals with the rest of the country. That can affect waiting times. As I said if services are so bad where you are and you think things are so much better in cities, why didn't you move to one?

MamaBearLockdown · 09/04/2020 12:27

Of course, but the time to go was BEFORE the lockdown

Who would reasonably chose to spend possibly months in isolation in a flat in a busy city when they have a house in a quieter area?

If it 's ok for the royal family, it's ok for everybody else. They were the first to scamper in a secondary palace.

It's people's HOME, why shouldn't have they gone there when they could.
Schools and shops were so late to close, no one was so concerned when people reasonably starting to go HOME.

turquoisedoor · 09/04/2020 12:30

People who left the cities (before lockdown) don't fear an army cot - because they know they're far far less likely to need medical help rurally. They won't catch the virus in the first place. What beds do you think they're using in the city temporary hospitals, where beds (and temporary mortuaries) are needed? Also, as I've said, most people who left cities aren't second homers. They're locals returning to their families.

mrscampbellblackagain · 09/04/2020 12:30

Giles Coren has stayed in London. He wrote a piece about how he would have liked to go to his country home but his wife basically said no for all the reasons outlined by the sensible posters on this thread.

AnnUumellemahaye · 09/04/2020 12:30

Giles Coren has been going between the two, then having the gall to make smug #stayhome tweets.

Yes, but he is at home, isn't he? He just has two of them. If he speaks to no-one and touches nothing except his steering wheel between houses then what difference does it make?

The 'Stay at Home' message means don't party, don't socialise, don't visit people, go out for the hell of it and hang around in crowds for the hell of it. Don't catch buses and trains for the hell of it. Stay indoors or in the privacy of your own garden as much as possible. I really don't think it matters which home you do it in, so long as you do it.

mrscampbellblackagain · 09/04/2020 12:31

I think second home owners are tolerated at the best of times but now, well they know very much how they are viewed by locals.

SarahInAccounts · 09/04/2020 12:31

@WhatWouldYouDoWhatWouldJesusDo

Medieval pitchfork wavers ? No my dear, that's fear from the reality of having 8 ICU beds to go around 500000 people.

And you think that justifies the threats of violence?

I don't.

MamaBearLockdown · 09/04/2020 12:35

for most people, the bigger property is their HOME - the place they have to be during work weeks in town is the temporary one...
So why shouldn't they go HOME.

WhatWouldYouDoWhatWouldJesusDo · 09/04/2020 12:35

turquoisedoor

Because I don't want to ?

Hey I'm happy to live with the downsides of rural / semi rural life. I'm happy to pay more or the same for a worse service, our poor transport links, the poverty in some areas, the fact we have to travel for three hours to do any decent sort of shopping, poor internet speeds, sporadic phone connection crap weather and even sheep popping up everywhere.

But I don't particularly want to die for the cause because a few selfish people came to a place that cannot offer the same healthcare choices to the people that they may infect.

Yes, the outbreaks in cities have been large and that's crap. But they also have huge arenas filled with thousands of ICU beds. As opposed to us and our 8 ICU beds shared between many thousands of people. The two don't even compare.

Original poster
Lardlizard · 09/04/2020 12:37

Yes localS don’t mind moving to cities to for work or selling to non locals

OP posts:
VivaLeBeaver · 09/04/2020 12:38

I don’t have a second home but if I did I would have got out of London before the lockdown was announced. Which I think is what most of the celebs, etc did.

Mistymonday · 09/04/2020 12:43

We’re buying a second home at the moment (not a first time buyer or family property, also remote). Sale has stalled but we would hope to go down there if sale goes through when lockdown gets lifted in the later summer, but only if the rules are changed. We wouldn't go now for obvious reasons! Plus we also have had the virus and have been isolating for the last 4 weeks so are a low spreading risk (and would be well away from people there anyway).

Happyadventurer · 09/04/2020 12:44

We have a second home and, no, we haven't travelled to it. It is reckless and irresponsible to do so right now.

turquoisedoor · 09/04/2020 12:44

Same here Viva
People in cities are apparently lucky that temporary hospitals have had to be built. I'd rather be somewhere that hasn't had that - because they don't need it.

MinnieMountain · 09/04/2020 12:49

@Lardlizard how is it suddenly wrong to move to a city for work? Surely that city then becomes your home and you're counted there for purposes of hospital beds etc.

I left Pembrokeshire age 22 for work. My 75yo DF still lives there with his partner who has COPD.

Rural healthcare is barely adequate at the best of times. DF says his cardiologist was crap; the local children's A&E closes to admissions at night. I could go on.

The people flocking down to Pembrokeshire are going out not staying in. They can't guarantee that they don't already have COVID. So how can they guarantee they won't need one of the 4 ICU beds in the whole county? It's so selfish.

ElementalIllusion · 09/04/2020 12:53

We are at our ‘second home’.
But we were already here when the lockdown was announced so I don’t think we did anything wrong staying here.