Why do people live in London?

[Waahaawoowoo]

This thread is inspired by a thread where people where explaining how a £100k salary doesn't go far in London. Examples were given of mortgages costing £25k pa. (This is my salary). Childcare bills for 2 kids costing £40k. Our joint salary is £55k pa.

I live in NE Wales. Our house costs us £12k pa for a 3 bedroom semi. Wraparound Childcare used to cost a maximum of £12k pa. But we no longer pay due to age of kids and me WFH. I cannot get my head around DH and I being significantly better off than a couple who earn double what we do.

The logical answer to me would be to move from London. So why do people stay? Is it family? The type of work you do? I'm curious more than anything about what keeps people there when they could possibly have a better standard of living elsewhere.

I like living in London because it doesn’t close down at half past five . I always get caught out when I visit places outside London ! Plus I like being able to rely on public transport, and I love going to the theatre and the cinema without having to plan an expedition equivalent to a hike in the foothills of Everest.

I lived in London for two and a half years, I have no idea why people live there. I have no idea if the people are more interesting as none of them spoke to me, I never knew any of my neighbours. Thankfully I don't live there now and know all my neighbours. If I want to go into London then it's possible - but it's rare because there are plenty of theatres and great restaurants outside London.

We have nothing like a £100k salary and live perfectly comfortably in London.

I'm pretty sure age & when you got on the housing ladder is more important than salary when calculating the cost of Londo.

It’s home.

I decided long ago that I hated driving, so that meant living somewhere with excellent public transport.

I’m in zone 4. I’ve got big parks, the Thames, great independent coffee shops, a library & big supermarkets all within walking distance, I can be in the centre in about 40 mins door to door & I know my neighbours (and their dogs) by name. Plus I have loads of friends here.

I lived in London for a long time before moving to the north. I never had a fancy salary, I was only ever working in pubs, nightclubs, kitchens etc. I managed perfectly well living with a friend or boyfriend, in rented houses. I didn't have a car because I didn't need one. London is huge, it's not just Central and the bits you see on telly, there's more affordable places- or at least they were more affordable ten years ago when I left.

I also want to say that Londoners are incredibly welcoming and friendly. I never feel out of place. I have friends from all over the world.

Because all life is here and some of us have always lived here so it is our home.

The joy of living in London is that you can visit other bits of the country on holiday, enjoy their beauty, peace and quiet etc and come back to a glorious, dirty hubbub.

Housing is expensive but transport is plentiful and relatively cheap and there is so much to visit and enjoy for free. The quality of education (state) is generally higher than the rest of the uk and whilst healthcare is no less busy you generally don't have to travel across the country to access it. Employment opportunities are myriad and theatres, concert venues & museums similar. You can do something different every night of the year (if you have the resources) and still have new things to look forward to.

It's horses for courses with places to live, but the things I have experienced as a born and bred Londoner are:

• World class cultural and sporting institutions
• Excellent transport that's free for children and over 60s
• Excellent, well funded schools
• Jobs you can't do in the shires with a higher top end earning potential
• Interesting, diverse people from all over the world attracted because of these things
• Access the excellent medical facilities - I have a major national teaching hospital on my doorstep

Whilst other places offer some of these things, in my experience none of them do to the same extent as London, and none have all of these. I do, however, think there is less appeal to living in London if you are on a low wage as you can earn similar elsewhere, but with lower living costs.

Because I grew up here and it's what I know (although I actually live on the other side of the city to where I grew up). Because I vastly appreciate having all the opportunities that London offers on my doorstep (yes of course people from outside London can travel in to likewise take advantage of these, but that requires forward planning). I have a household income of under £70k pa on which we live very comfortably (own our own house, we try to go on 3 foreign trips per year), but we do not have a car whereas if we lived elsewhere we would probably have to have at least one car.

@Choconut London isn't unfriendly but you do need to make a bit more of an effort. We know our neighbours well (we even have a building Whatsapp group)

Because its diverse ,multi -cultural and outside of London isn't, so places outside of london tend to produce more raciest unwelcoming environments.

I think it's lost a lot of its diversity in places particularly socio economically.

It’s a good job so many of us don’t mind living in the global financial, commercial & arts power house that is our capital city - and keeping it running directly or indirectly - otherwise the rest of the country would be effed!

North Wales would get a bit crowded if we all came and lived there too 😉

All joking aside - as you might imagine it’s complex. There are upsides to living here and downsides. I’ve been here 25 years and though I love it for lots of the reasons posted upthread. But Im ready to live elsewhere now though won’t be able to for 4 yrs +

Why do you live where you live op? Once you strip back all of the reasons like culture, careers, diversity, etc then why do a lot of people live where they live? I'm not originally from London but moved here 25 years ago. It does happen to be London I live in and i really love it - but mainly it's my friends, support network and liking the area I live in.

Yes I could move elsewhere and be better off but there would be a higher price to pay in terms of all of the friendships and sense of feeling like this is my home that has taken years to build. I'd rather be enriched by these things than have more money in an area where I know no one.

I lived in London for two and a half years, I have no idea why people live there. I have no idea if the people are more interesting as none of them spoke to me, I never knew any of my neighbours.

100% depends where you live. When I lived in a poor part of London, I never knew anyone. I moved to east London and again, never knew neighbours- only the concierge in our apartment. Moved to south west and see the same people all the time and sometimes say hi.

If you're not involved in any religious/community/voluntary groups or childcare things, you won't meet anyone unfortunately

Because it’s great here. Virtually anything I could possibly want to do any day or evening is on my doorstep, or a short train day trip away. My friends are here. My life is here. Nowhere else has the same job opportunities for what I do. I’ve lived elsewhere and I’ve always returned because nowhere else is as good.

I also don’t recognise the descriptions some people give of “Londoners” being unfriendly or aloof or snobby. Half of the people who live here were born elsewhere. It isn’t as if there’s any one demographic of culture or attitude which could possibly explain “Londoners” as a homogenous mass being unfriendly. We aren’t.

I loved our time in London. Such an exciting, vibrant city, with everything you could possibly want on your doorstep. Part of me will always slightly regret that we left.

We didn't go too far, though, and are still within an easy commute. Mainly because DH works in the City, in a job that only really exists in major financial centres, and I'm an actor, so it helps to have easy access to London-based work.

I live in London because it's where my husband's job is not because it's London.
He works within the social services sector so couldn't really do his job somewhere else because the people that need his support live in London.
I don't love London but I don't hate it either.

Culture, diversity, more privacy, better career opportunities, excellent transport links, better/more options for schools, better restaurants..

Firstly, it’s home. My grandma moved here from her home country to South London when she was 16/17. My whole family live in SW/SE London so why would I move?

I’m sure that you can understand that not everyone that lives in London will be like the couple in your OP. So many people here don’t own a home and a lot probably never will, most of us are okay with that. People live in house shares, rental properties or council flats. You don’t need to be on 100K+ to have a good quality of life in London.

Just because someone can get more for their money elsewhere in the country, doesn’t mean that they’re going to up and relocate to Wales now is it?

I briefly lived in Kent for a year in 2019 and my GOD. I was quite literally the only black person in Maidstone, it was fucking awful🤣 no hair shops, no West Indian food shops, no sense of home or people I can relate too. The local hospital there was shockingly AWFUL. You genuinely couldn’t pay me to leave London tbh

I’ve left London now but did love it there for a while.

I grew up there so family/friends/connections are a big reason people live there and stay. It’s shit that people are being forced out of their home town due to the housing crisis.

Diversity - it’s a diverse city, so that has its own appeal and a lot of people feel more at home in London due to the opportunities to connect with others through community centres, campaign groups, charities, language groups, different faith groups, multi-cultural supermarkets, restaurants etc etc etc. Obviously other cities are also diverse and have their own appeal but London really has it all. So if you’re not British-born, or you’re LGBQT+, or you’re Muslim - it’s easier to find people to relate to in a big city like London. It can be alienating if you feel different to others and there’s nobody else around ‘like you’.

It’s a major city with all the restaurants, bars, galleries, theatres etc you could want. There’s a buzz. You will never run out of things to do. That’s a big part of ‘standard of living’ (somewhere like NE Wales wouldn’t appeal to me - no offence at all intended @Waahaawoowoo but it’s just that different people want different things from life).

It is just a beautiful city (although it does have some ugly bits!) As a Londoner wandering around town, past St Paul’s or along the South Bank or up on Parliament Hill it is gorgeous. It’s fun, lively, amazing architecture. It has lots of distinct areas with their own personality and lots of choice.

Work. Lots of jobs you wouldn’t really get in other cities, or not to the same level. I think this is gradually changing with more remote working and more roles moving outside of the capital, but there is more work and better work for many people in London.

Loads of other stuff like logistics of being in a major city - for example I used to go away on holiday all the time from London as there’s a great choice of flights, from where I live now there’s less flights and so I travel less.

A lot of people come to London after university to develop their careers and end up staying. For most of our careers, we wouldn’t have been able to move somewhere else and both continue those careers so that was a major stumbling block. One of us earning much less would cancel out savings on mortgage. Commuter towns are as expensive as a lot of London areas with more expensive travel on top. Costs me £9 a day for the 2 days I go into the office.

I also like being able to walk to everything I need, 10 minutes on train into central London. Lots of green space where we are, lovely parks for kids. Mortgages high but we will be able to relocate somewhere cheaper when we are older and have some money left over.

We were both born & brought up here, our family are here, our friends are here. The idea of starting again somewhere new with a baby in tow... I worry I'd be quite lonely. Yes, I'd make new friends eventually but it would take a while.
Plus the logistics of choosing a new location (& the potential to get that wrong if you don't know the area well!), move jobs, sell up, wrangle pets and child to said location...
And work. Both our jobs can be done elsewhere but there are more opportunities for progression and more competitive rates of pay here.

As a foreigner, I make an effort to assimilate. I joined several groups, book clubs, volunteering....I put myself out there. If you don't do this, then yes, you won't meet anyone interesting. True of any big city.

I know your question wasn't directed at me but I'll answer anyway. Most weekends I will visit either a museum, art gallery, theatre or concert type event.

Almost all of my family and friends live in London.

I love the parks. I love that I don't have to drive anywhere.

In walking distance of my house I can get to one of the royal parks and see the deer, or I can walk along the river Thames tow path. I can be in Central London in 45 minutes.

I also don’t recognise the descriptions some people give of “Londoners” being unfriendly or aloof or snobby.

yes this annoys me or the DFL label, they are not Londoners normally but from the home counties! 😆