Would you stay in the UK if you were me?

[DozensOfRoses]

Looking for honest thoughts: should I stay in the UK, and if you were in my shoes what would you do? I'm late 20s, recently single and in a very decent professional career.

I've been a Londoner for a decade and consider it home, however I struggle to recognise the place I fell in love with. I feel like I work nonstop for a low quality of life and I'm not sure I can see any perks anymore. It just seems everything is in terminal decline here. I thought I would feel some hope with the new government but honestly after the last month it just feels a bit like they've given up too?

The quality of housing and transport is just so bad, it makes everything a pain on a daily basis. I'm lucky to own my own (tiny, mortgaged) one bed apartment within 45 minute commute, the kind of place I'm thrilled to have but anybody outside of London would consider appropriate for a student, not a highly paid professional. I feel like I'd lose the will to live if I had to commute any further, given the cost and regular disruption to commuter services.

I feel like I'm being robbed by utility companies (when I compare what I pay to anyone I know overseas, they are shocked). I can't see anything I get in return for my taxes (work pays for private health insurance and I've given up even trying the NHS doctors). I don't feel safe on the streets of London anymore, this might in part be due to getting older but I've seen so much crime recently and very little interest in doing anything about it. I want to have a family in the next few years but childcare here is shocking and I'm not sure I would be happy with the quality of non fee paying schools in many areas.

When I visit friends abroad I am stunned by the quality of life they have and I feel almost...gaslit? into my low expectations after 10 years in London.

I'm originally from another English-speaking western country and in terms of visas in a very privileged position (would be highly mobile). I work in a very internationalised professional service (think consulting, banking, trading or corporate law) where I can move around a year from now to a role earning from £100-200k (and which would pay the same or more abroad). Obviously moving would be a pain and I would be starting over in terms of my life, but I'm not sure I see a future here anymore. I think the last few years I have been waiting it out to see if things will get better but I'm losing hope.

Honestly: what would you do in my position? Can anyone see things getting better? And those who have decided to make the move, how has it gone?

I felt exactly the same about London and the UK in my late 20s/early 30s, twenty years ago. I decided that I loved London, but living there was so unreasonably annoying in little ways, that I would leave before I started hating it.

We did leave, and I don't regret it. I still love London, but I feel I enjoy it and make the most out of it more when I visit now than I ever did when I lived there.

That's interesting to know, thank you! Where did you go if you don't mind me asking? And what worked well about the move?

Personally I would jump at the opportunity to live in Australia! If you like hot weather and beach lifestyle. It is expensive to rent property though.
My friends who live in Canada love it, an amazing outdoor lifestyle and excellent education system (they are teachers). healthcare is expensive though and lots of social problems.
If you are open to change and challenge, you can always relocate if you don’t find somewhere to your liking.

I felt exactly like that in my late twenties and I did move. I am also not from the Uk, but lived in London for about a decade.

It's been another decade now and I don't regret moving. I miss London at times (I live in a large European city, but nowhere near the size of London), but my quality of life is so much better.

I visit London often to see my friends and they are all in great careers, but significantly worse off than we are. Our living costs, healthcare etc are not comparable.

I would move if I were you.

You don’t have a family in London or any strong strings to keep you attached.

it’s a no brainer! You are not happy, the world is your oyster, I would move in your place.

No, but I was in that position 30 years ago and now my children are.

London is expensive but I really don't recognise the idea that it's in terminal decline.

Transport is better than anywhere else in the UK
Schools achieve better than elsewhere in the UK.
It is no more unsafe than it has ever been. If anything, I probably feel safer than I did in my 20s. The joys of middle aged woman invisibility. There is an issue with young men and knives but I don't think that is unique to the area inside the M25.

If you don't feel happy here, of course you should seize the chance to be happy somewhere else. But I don't think it's London that has changed.

Rent out your flat and get out there.
Doesn't have to be a lifelong decision after all.

Tell us the country you would move to!

I want to have a family in the next few years but childcare here is shocking and I'm not sure I would be happy with the quality of non fee paying schools in many areas

I think you should go because you’re determined to view it through a negative lens and it’s never going to meet the standards you’ve set yourself. Im fascinated by the idea that you’ve researched childcare & school options as someone with no children. I couldn’t have told you a single thing about those things as a single woman living there. I happen to know there are some excellent schools in London but I suspect this information doesn’t sit with the narrative you’ve told yourself.

I hear what you're saying, but the part I don't understand is you're saying "X is better than elsewhere in the UK", but it's still objectively bad. And far worse than it is in comparable countries. London commuter trains are horrible and unreliable, it doesn't make things better to know that they're even more terrible in other parts of the UK.

Crime is the one thing I feel I can say objectively has got worse: I have had maybe a dozen friends have something robbed in the last year (phones, bags, bikes). I've also personally witnessed a burglary. The police have been less than interested, you can show them where the item is on a tracker and they don't care. They seem surprised that you're hoping they would do something about it. It's not normal in a decent country

I would move where you get more value for money and a better quality of life. Do not stay if you are not making money and barely surviving. You need to create some sort of financial security and savings for the future. The U.K. is a rip off. The one thing the U.K. had going for was the safety but now it is much worse and crime is on the up.

I live in London and am in my early 50s. What you're describing is very common, lots of friends and acquaintances have left over the years. Once you feel like this it's probably better to leave.

For what it's worth I don't recognise what you describe at all. I find transport quick and better than most other places I've been, I don't feel unsafe (often walk home late at night alone), I like my flat etc. I think you just have the London ick, which usually means it's time to go. Think about your priorities though, I'm sure you can get a better quality of life in Dubai, but you'll have to reconcile to the human rights abuses , for example, which is much worse anything that happens in London.

I did exactly the same thing in my early 30's when I left four years ago. I had lived there over a decade and just fell out of love with it, the lack of money and the cost of everything made me so depressed.

I left, my job is massively less to what I was earning in London but my quality of life is so much better.

Go for it! Xx

I have some friends with young kids in London who are really struggling to make ends meet. One has had a lot of difficulty getting work because she can't find childcare to make it possible. I also see colleagues rushing around trying to make things work and it looks like a hard life: when your work is in central London and your commute 1-1.5 hours, and then they're struggling to balance it all. It seems tough.

There are definitely good schools in London. I imagine the houseprtices to get into these are quite bad though, possibly not something I would be able to afford? This probably wouldn't be the issue for me though to be honest, by then I would (should) be in a much better position anyway.

Just go. Nothing to lose. Keep your flat rented thru agency til you work out your life in 5 or 10 years.

I think that's very true, saying it is the "ick" really chimes for me. I'm seeing it all through a negative lens now. To be honest I've been quite negative about it for a while, I put so much on a change of government thinking I was going to feel some new hope. I know it's too soon for them to actually do anything but the doom and gloom messaging has certainly had an impact with me! I feel like I'm getting a message that things will get worse and don't expect life to be better? Is it just me, or does that seem to be what they're saying at the moment 😅

Yeah I think I'm going to start exploring that option now. With the state of the rental market in London it should be easy to rent out, it has four walls and a roof 😂

I honestly don't know how people make ends meet here. I know London is more expensive than most parts of the UK but the pay is also generally better. Everything just seems so expensive and I'm not clear what we get in exchange. Apparently we pay something like twice as much for electricity here as they do in France 😱

Those saying move up North… trust me the northern cities are in just as much decline as London, yes Manchester has shiny glass sky scrapers but at street level the city is not the same, obviously there are pockets of decent places but on the whole the city’s demographic has shifted and not for the better.

If you want more in terms of lifestyle then leaving the UK is your only option. The big cities are unrecognisable even to just a few years ago, the rot has well and truly set in.

Yep, go and work for Harney's or PWC or something.

Leave , London is going down hill very fast!!. I’m raging that there was nearly 5000 rapes last year, never mind the phone and handbag stealing, it really is not safe anymore and I don’t think it will get any better any time soon.

Somewhere cosmopolitan and international, with lots of young professionals and a good job market for my sector. Ideally some nice weather and the possibility to travel to other places. Somewhere with a nice safe life, good real estate and plenty of fun places to go. Good healthcare (happy with private, I get that through work anyway). Where there is the possibility to meet someone like me and make a life. Somewhere as well where the money I make would go a decent way. I'd love to live somewhere also that has a sense of ambition, like there is stuff being built and some optimism.

Any thoughts?

I think you have already made the decision. Now you’ve got to put into action.

However, remember, the grass isn’t always greener…

Yeah, I connect a lot with what you say here. I've been interested on this thread to hear people saying they feel otherwise, because I don't know anybody in real life in London who hasn't been shocked by the crime the last year or two. I've had more bad experiences the last 3 years than the previous 7 put together. I'm looking into the statistics now to see if that is shown in data or just something we moan about. I think part of the feeling of being unsafe is how many clearly desperate and (I think) homeless people often on drugs you see now, there's a growing number of walks I no longer do when the sun starts to set. Which means areas totally out of bounds for most of winter.