To want to leave London but not sure where to?

[HayzCo]

Early 30s, “two under two” and renting with my husband in London. We want move out of London (for the usual reasons) and have the flexibility to live anywhere now, as long as we can get to London once a week or so. Neither of us want to go back to where we grew up but other than that.. don’t really have a clue where to start.

If you made the move out of London, how did you decide where to go? What criteria did you consider?

AIBU to just pick a place that ticks boxes on paper and make the place home?

Look at where has good transport links to where you need to go in London. I live in Berkshire which is great for Paddington but a real pain in the arse for docklands. Good luck 😉

I live in Suffolk, you have the choice of towns, rural, seaside and about 1.5 hours away from London via the train. Some very beautiful small towns and villages here. If your renting you are roughly looking at £800-1000 a month for a 3 bed house depending where you live.

What boxes do you want ticking?

We came to East Kent following DH's job but I'm able to still commute to central London easily. Actually more easily than from zone 3 just a hell of a lot more expensive.

10 minutes from the sea. Very happy.

We looked at moving out of London.

What stopped us was while DH is WFH at the moment, if he changed jobs or lost his job, his work is only in London. There's no guarantee that any other job would have the same level of WFH.

So with that in mind, We've stayed in London but are further out. We can still commute into central London every day if we need but house prices are much better.

@ivykaty44

What boxes do you want ticking?

I think this might be the challenge, I’m not sure! If you all have a sense of what criteria to look for, that would be so helpful! Commute to London not being too horrendous is one - but 2hr door to door would be doable when only one day a week, so that hasn’t narrowed it down too much.

We went for an area we loved generally (seaside/countryside). Then narrowed it down further based on affordability, secondary school (older children than you), train line.

We actually moved (a lot) further down our train line, which makes it easy for still seeing people left behind.

As a pp says I'd start with where in London you need to be. I live in the East midlands and can get to London in an hour but only kings cross/Pancras. Very cheap where I am for housing, but train tickets dear peak time.

There’s a really helpful Facebook group called “Life after London”. We ended up narrowing our search around family and friends + commuting. Eg we would have loved Kent, but need to stay accessible to the West.

Which station do you commute into? We needed to get to London Bridge so looked at that line, did a bit of research and ended up in tonbridge. We love it here, good mix of everything we wanted.

If we were only commuting once a week we might've gone a bit further out, maybe even Hastings, I love the seaside! Do you have any family you want to be not too far from?

As a pp says I'd start with where in London you need to be.

This
Budget
Aiming to buy now/medium term?
Schools
Amenities needed

We identified that we wanted to go towards the NW as both our families are there. That means basically taking the A40/M40 route away from London. At that time chiltern railways was one of the best in terms of reliability so we literally got on the train at Marylebone and spent a couple of days travelling up the line, getting off everywhere within commuting distance and having a look around the towns and estate agents.

It didn't take us long to work out where we wanted and could afford to be and then we just focussed the search

I live SW, quite rural - seena lots of posts over the last few years of people moving from cities and loving it. I can imagine it’s a huge shock to the system though, one of you will benefit from having a driving license.. and an all terrain pushchair for the kids 😂

I’ll never leave, I truly love where I live; historic towns, tiny villages, woodland walks.. you can’t beat it IMO.

2 hours is a pretty wide range depending on how much travel across London you need to do. For example you could look at Grantham / Newark which are about 1 hour 10 / 20 into Kings Cross but that doesn’t take into account where you need to be after that? Also, what kind of place do you actually want to live in? They’re smaller market towns… not very diverse or cosmopolitan which may or may not matter to you. What kinds of activities do you do as a family? How far away would you be from your own family and what are transport link s be like for visits ? I’d be looking at schools, leisure activities, house prices and transport links. (“Vibe” is also important but hard to quantify )

What direction? Do you need to travel to visit family and not want to cross / go round London to do so?

Do you want to be rural, or in a town?

What’s your budget for rent, for how many rooms?

What facilities do you want to be close to? Cinemas? Ice rink? Swimming pool? Theatre and gallery? Or whatever is important for you?

Is it purely about the rent? What are the ‘usual reasons’?

Woodland walks would be lower down my list than good coffee so decide what’s important to your family.

What part of London do you need to get to? That's a big influence if you don't want to cross London as well as taking the train in. I'm in West Kent, where I grew up so it was the obvious choice, but it's good for London bridge/charing cross/canon street/Victoria. Though it made for a nasty commute when my office moved to Hackney. Also, Kent is a pain in the backside to get to other parts of the UK because you have to get around the m25 wherever you're headed. In times past though being so close to the coast and the continent were great.

We live in a village, so our train connection is slower but there's a great sense of community and house prices are cheaper than say Sevenoaks which has a really fast train line. Most of the primary schools are good but some are very small in the villages, which some people like and some don't. We find that the further you go from London into Kent, the more the towns have their own life - Tunbridge Wells is lovely but for us was too much time on the train. All the towns and villages have their own character so I'd say it's best to narrow down your options and spend some time there rather than just picking a place on paper.

Well you can narrow it down by deciding if you want a town/city or countryside or coast. Life with children is easier in an urban areas imo. Then the commute into London - check timings to the best mainline station for current jobs. Then just in terms of affordability - north is obviously cheaper than south of England. But don't dismiss further afield - Wales or Scotland have major cities, good transport links (to London!), yet much more affordable

I left London and moved to Hampshire. I am just under 50 minutes to London Waterloo. I live near nice parks, good schools and soft plays etc. And shopping in nearby places like reading or Basingstoke is only a 25 minute drive.

When I left central London but still needed / wanted London to be accessible, my decision was that I would be north of London. This is because my family and friends were all north e.g. Manchester, Liverpool and when I lived in SW London and went to visit the drive around the north and south circular added a lot to my journey. So perhaps a NESW decision could be the first one?

I decided upon Hertfordshire and at first was looking in all parts but then a friend happened to be in a particular part of Hertfordshire and I got to know it a little and ended up moving there. It was a good location for regular and fairly fast trains into London which was another selling point.

I think this might be the challenge, I’m not sure! If you all have a sense of what criteria to look for, that would be so helpful! Commute to London not being too horrendous is one - but 2hr door to door would be doable when only one day a week, so that hasn’t narrowed it down too much.

where I live is 1.20 hrs to London Marylebone, train every hour

two swimming pools, big city nearby, 3 market style towns to choose from

very decent schools

plenty of activities and clubs

10 minutes cycle into the countryside from all three towns

artisan shops and a coffee shop on every corner and in-between along with a good splattering of independent shops

regular market with both fruit and veg stalls and artisan stalls on both Saturday Sunday and mid week

I’m from london originally. Moved out to brighton, then to surrey countryside back to brighton and would love to move to Liverpool.

My experience in Surrey taught me that culture and vibe are very important. I loved the countryside but didn’t make any friends at all. I feel so lucky that w removed back just before lockdown when I was pregnant.

Criteria for me are:

Quality of life
Affordability
Green space
Handsomeness of city
Can you do the stuff you like- yoga or dance or improv or soft play or farms or whatever?
What are schools like?
Commute to loved ones?

For me, the feel of the place and it’s history and the weather are all important. I like liverpool for example because it has masses of green space, strong civic identity, big arts scene, not poncey, has all the classes and activities I enjoy, high number of listed buildings, more friendly, good value for money.

Also it’s about the specific area within a city. So if we ever did move it would be to around Sefton park/aigburth/toxteth/calderdtones - very green, south of the centre, near the airport and strong community spirit.

What’s your list?

I agree with everyone else that you'll get most bangs for your buck by locating yourself on the right trainline for your work. A house that's a 90 minute train ride from (say) London Bridge will probably be much cheaper than somewhere that's a 45 minute train ride from Paddington and then 45 minutes across London.

Then work your way up the line as a PP has suggested

@Angliski

I just visited Liverpool for the first time and was really impressed with it. I have zero family over that way but I could imagine living there definitely. Very compact city centre but loads going on. The train into Euston was just over 2 hours too so good links.

You want green space, easy access to London, good schools.

If I had my time again, I'd go to Kent. Tunbridge Wells is expensive but Tonbridge is better value and there are lots of smaller places on train lines worth investigating.