So fed up with my life

[onandon8]

I live in London and am just so fed up with the people, the busyness, the noise, the pollution and the cost of everything, particularly housing. It’s really getting me down.

I want to sell up and buy a cottage by the sea in Devon or Cornwall, but DH will only consider counties close to London as there are always employment opportunities here.

I know what he’s saying but I don’t want to carry on with the rat race for the rest of our lives, living in an average area with a massive mortgage to pay each month.

I also read threads on here saying London schools are the best, and wonder in which part of London these posters live? Primaries near us are good/outstanding but the secondaries are dire - I can’t consign my DC to a life of that.

I would love to send them private but we don’t have anywhere near that kind of money. All the local private schools offer bursaries, but surely they must be inundated with applicants - does anyone know how easy it is to get one?

AIBU to want to leave London behind and have a different, simpler life in a small seaside town, with a mortgage of about £400-£500 per month?

Agree about teens having the freedom of free or low cost travel in London

Dc have loved their lives here, even though we are on the very outskirts. Meeting friends in Covent Garden or on the South Bank or Summers learning to skateboard in Hyde Park

One thing I noticed when friend moved away was how far everything was and how much it cost to entertain the children.

I loved loved loved growing up in London. So much freedom and free stuff to do (pre-Covid). I also love not having to give my DC lifts everywhere, they're happy to make their own way around as it's so easy.

I do have a living in a village fantasy though, so understand your feelings, but not sure if I could actually handle it.

I loved growing up in London too

Agree with @KnightError and @ClaireP20 about Truro.

I'd like to be closer to Truro, but our son's special school is in Plymouth and I'm not giving that up for anything...

Whenever I'm in Truro I do feel more surrounded by like minded people than I do in my little seaside village near Looe (which I love, and our neighbours/friends are wonderful, but I feel more 'me' in the Truro vibe, as an ex-Londoner)

I'm a self-employed consultant, a bit like your partner, OP. And have never ever had trouble finding work. I did bring some clients with me from London days, but over the last eight years I'd say at least 70% of my work has come from local clients.

At the start I did have to adjust my day rate downwards a bit for local clients, but those days have passed and it's no longer necessary.

I also don't travel to London anymore really. That stopped about a year before covid. Do everything on video, pretty much.

My DH is the same. He's in a very senior strategic role for a global organisation and works from home pretty much all the time now. He used to travel to London weekly for 1 or 2 nights at a time (except in August and December when he would be home full time), and this was eminently doable via train or from Exeter or Newquay airport.

You don't have to be stuck to a life of averageness in the Home Counties. (I am biased because I had a very well to do upbringing in the Home Counties, that I wouldn't want to repeat with my own children because of the status climbing, materialistic, money driven values that I personally find very off putting).

I don't want to be a jeremiah but you would also have to factor in the huge disparity between London public transport costs and efficiency and public transport and roads in Cornwall and Devon. You will need a car . Schools and Hospitals are far apart.
I was amazed when I was told that any bus journey in London was £1-50 ;where I am in Dorset it costs £4 to go a mile to the next town , if there is a bus service and there are no trains .The slow country roads get packed in the summer.

I’m not a city person. But... London has so much going for it, most of which has been on hold for much of this year. Would you not be better making this decision when things feel more “normal”?

Would you not be better making this decision when things feel more “normal”?

Maybe.

You don't have to be stuck to a life of averageness in the Home Counties. (I am biased because I had a very well to do upbringing in the Home Counties, that I wouldn't want to repeat with my own children because of the status climbing, materialistic, money driven values that I personally find very off putting).

I agree - the Home Counties are really not for me.

I agree - the Home Counties are really not for me

Very sweeping statement to make.

You know the HC aren’t just 4 bed semis on a 1930s estate. There are villages and cottages and fields. And some places have a lovely coastline.

Equally not all of London is dirty, noisy and has people wandering around with knives.

I am 30 minute drive from Marble Arch with a clear run through on a Saturday morning and I have horse riders riding past my front gate. We have sheep and cows in fields and my house had its own stabling.
My friend lives further out and is surrounded by countryside and is 35/40 minutes to a lovely coastal area

Don’t feel we live an average life as we have the best of both worlds and friend has the sea within easy reach.

What about Exeter? Close to Bristol which is an amazing city, access to beaches, university town.

Cardiff to London is good

I agree with @Oliversmumsarmy that the Home Counties have a lot of hidden treasures. We are 30 mins by train from the West End - so a shorter commute than when we lived in Zone 2 and travelled by tube. We look out over wooded hills of wild deer. There are cows, horses and sheep in the fields, and during lockdown we have felt so thankful that there's a different walk to go on from our doorstep every day of the week. It has been a safe place to raise DC, with good schools, but if they want excitement as teens, they headed off into nearby towns and London.

She is! Just pointing out that rejecting half a dozen counties might be missing out.