AIBU to think about moving to Liverpool

[SauceGirl]

Hello wise Mumsnetters.
I live in London and am thinking of moving to Liverpool. I can work from anywhere and feel like I need a change. I have a cousin and a uni friend who live up there. The only thing I'm not sure about is the areas. I've been looking at Toxteth, Old Swan, Waverly and Sefton Park. Are there any other nice or up-and-coming area that I should consider?
Thanks in advance all!

@crimesagainstwine

👏👏👏 Well said.
OP is likely to have got very different answers if they'd been a bit more truthful in the first place

[quote SauceGirl]@Ponoka7 How come you don't like Waverley?[/quote]
There is no Waverley..........but there IS a Wavertree - postcode L15

@FayCarew

I know someone who lives in Childwall and she says the L and the D.

Wiki says that Wavertree is pronounced Wautry - is that correct?

No - not correct 🙄

I would suggest aigburth, Allerton, Mossley Hill areas

@Foxglovers thanks so much for your advice. I had a look at Mossley Hill pretty pricey!

I'm so jealous. I would move to Liverpool in a heartbeat if I could. My friend lives in A posh part of Garston. It's lovely as is Aigburth or Sefton park. Love park lane!

I’m from the Wirral and honestly it’s just really boring and provincial. Lovely beaches blah blah blah but people are quite insular although very friendly in manner. Everybody moves away for uni then goes back to raise their kids so nobody needs to look outwards for friends

Id honestly only move here if you’re over 45 or if you have children to raise in a safe mainly rural environment

@FayCarew

I know someone who lives in Childwall and she says the L and the D.

Wiki says that Wavertree is pronounced Wautry - is that correct?

No it’s waver tree

But run together of course

I am from the Wirral but lived in liverpool for many years am now in Yorkshire that’s great come here liverpool is more crazy and fun the Wirral is not as friendly and parts are quite snobby

I was there recently and loved it -

However, rent for a year to see if it works for you. Let out your place in London if you own there.

[quote crimesagainstwine]@SauceGirl - that wasn't my point! Why do you need to buy an additional house/flat to rent out and then buy something for yourself?

It's nothing to do with your accent more your attitude.

There are streets in Liverpool being bought up as buy to rent/student properties and local people are priced out of the market

It's not something that many find funny

Come to Liverpool, buy a property, love the city (and wider area) but stop being greedy. There are thousands of young Liverpool residents who cannot get on the property ladder because some folks thing they will buy one for themselves and one as "an insurance"

We do not judge people on their accents here but their attitude to life and others[/quote]
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

As a local family trying to buy a house in Wavertree has proved an absolute nightmare. OP Please don’t come and turn yet another house into a HMO, destroying the local area for residents so you can have something to do.

@kerosene20 lol not sure where you got that idea from.

Wealthy southener wfh investing in the north. Novel Funny how it's never the opposite way round.

@TerribleZebra

Waterloo and Crosby are lovely but might be out of your price range. I have family in Litherland and the bit they are in is fine.

This! Ignore the poster saying south Liverpool is better

@Goudanuff

North liverpool - Maghull, Aintree, Old Roan and Melling are nice and you will get something in your price range, you could even look into Ormskirk, depends how close you want to be to the city centre!

Childwall - pronounce Chill wall!

I agree all 20 minutes on the train into the city too.

I live in Childwall and it is definitely pronounced Chillwall. You might get a doer upper in the north parts near the end of the motorway but not in the part nearest to calderstones park. Parts of wavertree around king David school are lovely - but you’ll not get much for your budget there. You’re probably looking at the streets off Allerton Road or Penny Lane. Once you are heading upSmithdown Road you’re in student territory.
Garston or parts of Aigburth are worth looking at.
In my opinion the south side of the city is the best - I wouldn’t go over to Everton or Bootle, or Croxteth or Norris Green.
If you can get something you like in your budget you won’t regret being in Liverpool - I’ve been here for over 30 years and love it.

@SausageFox
That takes me back… I still remember standing on the forks watching Canny Farm school burn down!

• field… not sure where forks came from!

Sorry you will no doubt find this comment useless and unwarranted but I don’t recommend Liverpool at all. It’s provincial and tatty. The dock area is nice but the city centre itself is crap. I’ve lived in both Manchester and Liverpool and hated Liverpool. I actually got a culture shock, so it’ll be worse for you coming from London. The suburban areas are boring and lack character. Many areas are insular and all for themselves. I found Liverpool incredibly depressing. Nothing against Scousers individually but you can’t say anything against Liverpool to a lot of them. Many are very defensive over their city due to certain events, understandably of course.

Manchester is better in every department tbh. Shopping is brilliant, and you have the Trafford Centre. The city itself is gorgeous these days and maintained well IME. The Metrolink tram system knocks Merseryrail out of the park. Manchester is general just has more to it than Liverpool.

Also, avoid Toxteth like the plague!

Odious place, and this is coming from somehow who grew up in a shithole area.

avoid Kensington which people have been saying is up and coming.g for 20 years and it's still very rough

I grew up in Kensington, left in '98 aged 15. It ruined my childhood. It's been over 20 years since I lived there, but Wavertree was an absolute wasteland shithole back then. Toxteth was rough too and had a terrible reputation going back to the race riots. Old Swan is close to Kensington. Everton and Anfield also not great. Norris Green was dreadful - that poor young boy, Rhys Jones was shot there a few years back. Edge Hill was awful. There's a bigger student population in some of these areas now, which can only be a good thing (compared to the awful people I remember having as neighbours).

My school was near Sefton Park and it's the only nice part of the city I saw growing up. (I only really lived my life in the shit areas.)

Though I've retained the standard pride that most scousers have to be from Liverpool, nothing could compel me to return.

Honestly, people who don’t know it think Liverpool is this worldly, cultural city but it isn’t. It is still stuck on the Beatles which says it all really. I know people who moved expecting a culture hub and were sorely disappointed.

It’s just like any other provincial UK city except with a dock.

Manchester knocks it put of the park. Of course that is still provincial compared to London but it has so much going on these days. Deansgate Square, Media City (with the BBC an ITV studios!). And further out it still has unique areas to offer and neighbourhoods with character like Didsbury. It’s got that proper Northern character to it and is very much the hub of the North, Liverpool is more one on its own.

I’d very much recommend considering Manchester instead if you’re wanting to come up north.

I should say though, I lived in Leeds for a year and was so relieved to get back to Liverpool (Leeds was a shithole). So if I had a choice I'd choose Liverpool, but I still can't wait to leave.

Allerton, Woolton, Penny Lane, and some parts of the Wirral I'd recommend I suppose.

Sefton Park and Allerton near Calderstones Park both nice