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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To want to escape the ghetto

457 replies

N15 · 29/06/2023 08:37

I have name changed for this for obvious reasons.

I live in a part of London that has long resisted gentrification, and has a stubbornly high (and rising) crime rate. Stabbings, and even shootings, are far too common. Neighbours have witnessed shootings, with their children. The local secondaries are seen as finishing schools for criminals, with a lot of gang involvement, and knives carried around.

I really worry about my children when they reach secondary school age. I would sooner home school than send them to the local secondaries, but I don't have the ability to home school due to working. I work as a junior doctor, but the wages are low, especially for London.

Any suggestions for an area with decent schools that doesn't break the bank? I would need 4+ bedrooms. Even open to buying land and building, anything to escape.

OP posts:
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sunflowersunday · 29/06/2023 14:10

4 bedroom and breaking the bank go hand in hand in the South East.

Comedycook · 29/06/2023 14:13

If you're worried about secondary schools op, then you probably should leave London. Your budget will be irrelevant. Even affluent areas in London will have pockets of deprivation and virtually all state schools will have a wide socio economic demographic of pupils.

sunflowersunday · 29/06/2023 14:14

I do feel for you OP. We have awful anti social behaviour on our council estate and having to live with these people day in day out is depressing. I’m counting the days till our escape. I hope you find your escape soon.

LeonardCohensRaincoat · 29/06/2023 14:14

Sometimes on here, I wish people would think about the areas they are moving into and the people who are originally from there.

I grew up in a nice part of a not quite so salubrious area. It’s difficult for non Londoners to understand the nuance of areas until they live here. I attended a good school in a nice part of London but am shocked at the snobbery of those who look at these old areas (where they bought a house cheaply for London) and don’t even talk to locals.

At work, I could easily be in the same graduate job as you. At university, the same course.

I hate the way this city has turned out at times. It was always a place for people to make their money but it has been reduced to just that now. Everything is so corporate including the people who now come and I wonder, do they not realise that they are often part of the problem? As we worked really hard in our communities to help the less fortunate than us, all the money and resources were really just going to people who were already privileged and could just position themselves at the flow of free money. This was by design, I think to make London even more of a global city and now we have junior doctors talking about areas as ghettos when we worked so hard to improve the Brixtons, Peckhams, etc of the 70s into something that worked for all of the people there.

Lavenderflower · 29/06/2023 14:14

Are you able to move to catchment of APS & Fortismere. Have you considered Latymer? Barnet generally has good schools and the some parts of the borough are reasonable.

beAsensible1 · 29/06/2023 14:21

AntiStuff · 29/06/2023 13:33

I also lived in N15 until very recently, my child was born and raised there. I didn't recognise Tottenham from the OP's original post, although I did wonder if she was referring to Edmonton.

Gentrification is all over N15, can't move for loft conversions and sourdough, but there were still pockets of hideous poverty, much like a lot of London. Good primary schools, lots of green space, loads going on for kids. N17 changing more slowly, but it's happening. Secondary schools definitely still an issue, but there are some amazing committed teachers trying their best. s

We've moved out of London to be closer to family, but there's crime here too, and I generally feel less safe because there are fewer people around. Deprivation exists outside of London and aspirations are very low.

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lovely. I grew up there it has lots of parks and great transport links. and it has gotten much better in the last decade or so.

people tarnish so much of london when local councils make so little effort until developers start sniffing around

Ladybirdlashes · 29/06/2023 14:25

What about Milton Keynes? You could commute to London and although travel expenses would increase housing is cheaper. I don’t know MK well but this one sounds like it’s close to the train station for commuting…

https://www.zoopla.co.uk/for-sale/details/64995353?utm_source=v1:5bWFDybfWx7C7AGpeagt7mP3PgcqjuqJ&utm_medium=api

Original poster
N15 · 29/06/2023 14:36

beAsensible1 · 29/06/2023 14:09

Have you thought about latymer school?

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It's been suggested a few times. Unfortunately my eldest would never pass the entrance exam. It would be pointless entering them for it. It's a great option though if you have a bright child (and they need to be super bright to pass)

OP posts:
Original poster
N15 · 29/06/2023 14:38

Thank you for the suggestions of the ladder and gardens. Unfortunately that wouldn't solve the secondary issue.

Cambridge is lovely I'm sure but a bit far currently. Aiming to stay near North London. If I moved out, I would go further north to maximise buying potential.

OP posts:
Simianwalk · 29/06/2023 14:39

Trinity65 · 29/06/2023 09:23

It is rife on here

Good on you for calling it out

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It is quite true though. Try living in parts of the countryside as a non-white person and it gets tiresome.

PedalStool · 29/06/2023 14:39

N15 · 29/06/2023 14:38

Thank you for the suggestions of the ladder and gardens. Unfortunately that wouldn't solve the secondary issue.

Cambridge is lovely I'm sure but a bit far currently. Aiming to stay near North London. If I moved out, I would go further north to maximise buying potential.

Why not look at Barnet/Totteridge and those areas? My doctor friends’ kids go to Mill Hill County secondary and are doing very well there.

Comedycook · 29/06/2023 14:41

If you need to be close to North London, I'd be looking at Barnet, St Alban's, Bushey, Edgware. Anywhere at the end of the tube on the NW side

Partyatno10 · 29/06/2023 14:43

East London - Woodford, South Woodford, Snaresbrook, wanstead would be a short commute to North London for work and very nice areas. You'd definitely get a house in budget and good schools and Epping forest on your doorstep.

Mumsanetta · 29/06/2023 14:44

Setyoufree · 29/06/2023 13:30

Welcome to the world of thousands of professionals in St Albans who do just that every day. House next to the station doesn't get you a secondary school catchment. However, marshalswick does get you a 10 minute drive to the station, a leafy area with good secondary schools, 4 bedrooms and a garden within the budget. Which was the brief. Not quite sure why you're starting a fight on this? I'm sure OP is capable of working out whether it's a compromise she's willing to make, since all options will be a compromise.....

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”Welcome to the world of thousands of professionals in St Albans who do just that every day.” Like me? How condescending.

Starting a fight? Where do you live and what’s your background for you to construe my words as starting a fight? And you’re the one who responded to me in the first instance to correct what I said based on your experience as a “compulsive rightmove watcher”. So bold of you to make such a strong assertion based on your armchair experience. I have been viewing houses in Marshalswick for the last 6 months so I have good first hand experience of what you can buy for the OP’s budget and real life doesn’t always mimick Rightmove. And I responded to this post in good humour because I was tickled by the suggestion that St Albans might be more affordable than Tottenham. Quite frankly I’m not sure why you had to be so aggressive.

For the record, now I’m starting a fight.

TempsPerdu · 29/06/2023 14:49

We live in Enfield currently (grew up here) and attended Latymer myself back in the day. Genuinely mixed area, definitely not ‘the ghetto’, and we’ve been pretty happy here, but we’re thinking of moving further out for secondary schools as, Latymer aside, our other local options aren’t especially attractive. DD is academic but I don’t want to put her through the ridiculous level of hothousing that is necessary these days for super-selective like Latymer.

Personally I think NW London options as suggested by pps are a better bet to access a range of good schools - Barnet in particular has some cheaper areas.

twilightcafe · 29/06/2023 14:51

@beAsensible1 'people tarnish so much of london when local councils make so little effort until developers start sniffing around'

Ain't that the truth!
Look at Newham. Left to rot until the fancy tower blocks started going up.

Laffinalltheway · 29/06/2023 14:55

N15 · 29/06/2023 11:59

😂

To be fair, twenty years ago it was. It has gentrified very rapidly. I can't see Tottenham following suit though.

I apologise for any negative connotations or offence from the word ghetto.

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I lived in Stoke Newington in the 70s and my God, it was a shit hole! I lived on Brooke Road near the fire station. All of the warehouses opposite were being demolished so the rats and mice had to find alternative accommodation, as in the inhabited houses.

Everywhere around it was a dump as well, Church St, Dalston, Stamford Hill, Hackney, it was all the same.

TiredCatLady · 29/06/2023 14:55

If your budget is that high then why stay in London at all? You’ve a job that can be done pretty much anywhere in the country so u less you’re tied by family or DP job then head somewhere cheaper where you’ll have more choice and probably end up paying a lower mortgage.

vacances · 29/06/2023 14:56

Honestly OP, in your situation I would put safety / quality of environment first and move to West / SW London and just have a commute. Look for somewhere on the right tube line - where do you have to commute to exactly?

sunflowersunday · 29/06/2023 14:57

Setyoufree · 29/06/2023 11:34

If you're working in north London, for that budget you could get what you need in Potters Bar or St Albans

OP can afford London so won’t have to settle for what is essentially an overpriced retirement village in Hertfordshire. OP do not make the same mistake as many Londoners do and move to St Albans expecting a vibrant city.

Voerendaal · 29/06/2023 15:04

Wilmslow - could get a lovely house for a million quid and close to Manchester teaching hospitals - sadly in the north but if you can get past that much more bang for your buck -

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