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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask how you afford to live in London?

505 replies

seekinglondonlife · 26/12/2021 20:32

Name changed regular as my family are on MN and I don't want my posting history linked.
We decided to do Christmas in London this year, we've had a crap year and just wanted to get away. We're staying in a fairly central hotel, have been travelling around and exploring by bus everyday and I feel like I really want to move here. The diversity, having shops open on a Sunday past 5pm, the atmosphere, the ability to choose 5 or 6 different ethnic restaurants on the same street. The public transport is fantastic.

I've been looking in so many estate agents windows and cannot get over the cost of rent/to buy a property. How do 'normal' people live here? I've been friendly with a few of the hotel staff, they've lived and worked in London for 20+ years and have raised their families here, but they are on NMW jobs, so how do they do it? Does everyone get housing benefit?

If you feel inclined please say roughly where you live and how much you pay for rent/mortgage. Also what are the downsides? (Apart from the cost of housing!)

TIA

OP posts:
smurfsss · 26/12/2021 20:57

@seekinglondonlife

Thank you for all of the replies. Just to clarify, vI don't want to live in zone 1 (as if that could happen!) but was in Shepherds Bush and Golders Green today and really liked the feeling for those. Still mad prices though. My next question is do families raise several children in a flat? I remember on the Jewish thread a poster saying 7 dc in a 2 bed wasn't unusual... Surely that would be a terrible quality of life? Or are Londoners just minimalists and 3dc in a 2 bed flat is perfectly doable?
We have 2DC in a 2 bed flat. Perfectly doable. London is there as soon as we open our door.. We never have any need to travel outside of zone 1, unless we're getting away to the countryside.

We have parks on our doorstep and endless entertainment for the family.

Lockdown was incredibly hard, but now everything open again it's fantastic!

tectonicplates · 26/12/2021 20:58

I remember on the Jewish thread a poster saying 7 dc in a 2 bed wasn't unusual...

That's a particular sub-section of ultra-orthodox Jewish people living in the Stamford Hill area. It's not normal for most other people.

Goldbar · 26/12/2021 20:59

We live in a nice family area in zone 3 in a 3 bed semi with a postage stamp garden for which we paid just under £800k. We had a large deposit (DH and I both high earners pre-DC though I earn a lot less now) Mortgage is around £1500, which we can easily afford on our combined salary. We love London and everything it offers but we are very jealous of our friends' houses who have moved out Smile.

TeddingtonSchools · 26/12/2021 20:59

We rented for many years in central London then bought an ex council flat in a not very fashionable area in 2007. That not very fashionable area recently got named the best place to live in London and is highly desirable now. We sold our flat a couple of years ago for almost 3 times what we paid for it, and that plus an inheritance meant we could buy a family sized home, the prices are completely bonkers though - we could buy something like this for the same price we paid for our Edwardian semi. So in our case it was luck in equity and inheritance. A lot of our friends ended up moving out of London to places like Bristol, Stroud and Oxford.

Beaconoflight · 26/12/2021 20:59

We are in zone 3 - paying £1800 for a 3 bedrooms place. I opened my own nursery meaning I never paid childcare for my kids. I absolutely love living in London, would find it hard living anywhere else !

safazz · 26/12/2021 20:59

OP, what is you budget, roughly?

For families, SW London is ideal. Putney, Barnes etc have plenty going on on, but also easy access into town.

Or go a little further out - Richmond, Teddington, St Margaret’s etc. A bit cheaper?

CouldThisReallyBe · 26/12/2021 20:59

It depends if you're thinking of renting or buying. I've lived in London for 26 years, was in hospitality for 10 years (so not high earner) and switched careers about 15 years ago and worked my way up (so now high earner). I still can't afford to buy and have resigned myself to always renting if I want to live in London. For me it's a lifestyle choice. I'd rather rent and have the benefits of London than buy somewhere affordable outside London.

To answer your question: I live in Zone 3, SW London - nice leafy area with lots of parks and good schools. My rent for a 2 bed garden flat is £1300.

Original poster
seekinglondonlife · 26/12/2021 21:00

@KittenKong I went for a walk yesterday in Hyde Park area and fell in love with the mews houses. Then saw an estate agent advertising them for £3-4m! Shock DH and I were wondering who on earth lived in them and how they can afford them!

OP posts:
onlychildhamster · 26/12/2021 21:00

@seekinglondonlife And no inheritance as well. No 6 figure salaries. Just lived at home and saved 70k and got a big mortgage on a 2 bed flat in zone 3. We are overpaying an extra £1k per month so we can upgrade to a 3 bed flat and have a child. DH is a life long Londoner and we will live near his mum who will help us a little with childcare.

I think it's a combination of (a)inheritance/living with parents, (b) delaying kids and (c) decent salaries. I love London and honestly I would sooner move country than move city.

Comedycook · 26/12/2021 21:00

I have heard that Stamford hill is getting so expensive that a lot of the ultra orthodox Jewish people are moving out to Canvey island.

stalkersaga · 26/12/2021 21:01

Bought a terrace in a then unfashionable area of Zone 2 with savings & a redundancy payment ten years ago. Area became cool and property more than doubled in value in six years. Moved out to zone 4 and bought and extended a semi which now has 5 beds. We pay £1700 a month in mortgage on our house.

So a bit of having money in hand at the right time, a bit of luck, and also earning v good London salaries.

I love this fucking city. Every bit of it. I couldn't live anywhere else. That said, I have a thick skin for the minor aggravations of living close to large numbers of other people. I like visiting the country, but to live there would bore me senseless. I thrive on the anonymity and the culture and the art and the fashion and the diversity and the politics and the food and the centricity of it all. And I love to walk and I like public transport.

Bear2014 · 26/12/2021 21:02

We both had flats in the early 2000s in zone 2 before prices went nuts, me with a bit of help from parents and also by having a second job. Sold them and bought our 3 bed house. Also zone 2. It's small but right near a great park and 30 mins to work. A bit tight with 2 kids but we're happy. No idea how a lot of younger people buy here. We have ordinary jobs.

TedMullins · 26/12/2021 21:02

I’m single, earn 46k and bought a flat in zone 4 last year for 200k. It’s a small one bed and there’s no tube where I live but there is the overground and a fast train to London Bridge. I’m in my early 30s and had no help buying - just saved over the last 7-ish years. My mortgage is 800 per month.

Prior to that I lived in house shares with friends (or strangers when I first moved to London) and limited my budget in shared housing to 600pcm all in. This meant I didn’t live in the best places but kept things affordable. Of people I know, many of my friends are still in house shares in their mid 30s and they’re in professional jobs, or they rent with a partner. Some may have afforded to buy a 2 bed with a partner but I would say most people on ‘normal’ incomes are in flats rather than houses, and as others have said, not in zone 1.

People who were born and bred here may have secure lifelong council tenancies or have bought homes before prices went mental. Younger people raised here may still live with family - I have a few friends whose parents have a large house in London bought 30+ years ago and they still live with parents in their 20s/30s because moving out would be so expensive. I would imagine hospitality staff are either living with family, house sharing or living in 1/2 bed flats.

If you have two professionals earning around 45k each you could afford a 2 bed flat in zone 4 in south London, but if you had kids, affording childcare on top of that would probably be a struggle.

Comedycook · 26/12/2021 21:03

You'll find in more expensive areas, the people are either very wealthy or rather poor and living in social housing. No one in the middle can afford it!

CeibaTree · 26/12/2021 21:03

@seekinglondonlife

Also, I have seen so many blocks of what I assume are council/social housing stock. Is it easy to get these properties, or is the waiting list years long?
A lot of these would be privately owned now. But yes massive waiting lists for any social housing just like any other big city.

We are in zone 6 and our mortgage is £1400 per month which is about a quarter of our combined take home pay.

Nosnowthisyear · 26/12/2021 21:04

When I was teaching in London I lived in a house share with five other teachers all in the same school. I didn’t have a car but walked to work. Some teachers lived in ex-social housing in tower blocks.

I couldn’t afford to buy as I was single but it was just possible on the outskirts if you were a couple. I lived as far out on the district line as you could get.

TedMullins · 26/12/2021 21:04

[quote seekinglondonlife]@KittenKong I went for a walk yesterday in Hyde Park area and fell in love with the mews houses. Then saw an estate agent advertising them for £3-4m! Shock DH and I were wondering who on earth lived in them and how they can afford them![/quote]
‘Normal’ people don’t live there. Certain areas are the preserve of very rich people.

sunshineandshowers40 · 26/12/2021 21:05

Would love to live in zone 1/2, so much on your doorstep but unfortunately when we were looking in 2007 a one bed flat was over budget so bought in the suburbs. DH wants to move to the country, I want a city but the DC are happy where we are.

OnlyFoolsnMothers · 26/12/2021 21:06

@seekinglondonlife

Thank you for all of the replies. Just to clarify, vI don't want to live in zone 1 (as if that could happen!) but was in Shepherds Bush and Golders Green today and really liked the feeling for those. Still mad prices though. My next question is do families raise several children in a flat? I remember on the Jewish thread a poster saying 7 dc in a 2 bed wasn't unusual... Surely that would be a terrible quality of life? Or are Londoners just minimalists and 3dc in a 2 bed flat is perfectly doable?
Expensive areas/ live in south east london, zone 3/4 my 3 bed house probably would sell for £450-480k- Iooking at rightmove around the country I don’t think I get much more in other cities
stalkersaga · 26/12/2021 21:07

@seekinglondonlife

Also, I have seen so many blocks of what I assume are council/social housing stock. Is it easy to get these properties, or is the waiting list years long?
There is absolutely nil chance of getting a social housing property in London especially if you don't have ties there. You wouldn't even get added to the waiting list, which is in any case literally decades long, and populated with people who are in dire need and have always lived in London.
Original poster
seekinglondonlife · 26/12/2021 21:07

@safazz I don't have a budget, this is all fantasy sadly 😢 In my hometown £400k would buy you a 5 bed detached Victorian double fronted house with large garden... So the idea of spending £600k on a 2 bed flat seems rather perplexing. But I really want a summer crash pad.
Can I ask about gangs and how much of an issue this is? There was a thread not so long ago mentioning people leaving London due to gang associated crime, is this all over London or just in certain areas? I must say I've felt very safe here.

OP posts:
KittenKong · 26/12/2021 21:08

seekinglondonlife - yes that’s us! The mews next to us are a mix of those who bought very cheap back in the day (I remember when there were garages and workshops among them and damp flats above) with rich foreign money owners and rented out.

In our block it’s mostly foreign-owned and rented out these days - when we moved in there was quite a few professional retired elderly English ladies but they have all died off now.

onlychildhamster · 26/12/2021 21:09

@seekinglondonlife foreign investors increasingly buy the expensive properties in central London. There are lots of different markets for properties and mews houses near Hyde park aren't really for the average Londoner... And they never have been..my DH's mum bought her victorian terrace in zone 3 for 100k in 1997 and honestly that was at the top of her budget and she would never have been able to afford notting hill either on that budget. That same house is now worth £750k and while that is still extremely expensive, there are plenty of places outside London where a nice house would cost that much but orthodox Jews like her would still prioritize a terrace in that area in London over a house in the country.

TedMullins · 26/12/2021 21:10

Unless you’re involved with drugs or gang life there is next to zero chance of a middle class white person having bother with gangs. The violence is usually between gang members. I’ve lived in London 8 years and never been the victim of a crime but I was burgled when I lived in Leeds. Crime can happen anywhere.

Comedycook · 26/12/2021 21:10

[quote seekinglondonlife]@safazz I don't have a budget, this is all fantasy sadly 😢 In my hometown £400k would buy you a 5 bed detached Victorian double fronted house with large garden... So the idea of spending £600k on a 2 bed flat seems rather perplexing. But I really want a summer crash pad.
Can I ask about gangs and how much of an issue this is? There was a thread not so long ago mentioning people leaving London due to gang associated crime, is this all over London or just in certain areas? I must say I've felt very safe here.[/quote]
I've never been a victim of crime and lived in London all my life...40 years. Gang crime doesn't really affect an average person who isn't involved with it...it's usually between them and other gangs I think.