Dh wants to move back to London. Is he bonkers?

[iwasjustwondering]

I would like to keep my anonymity for this thread hence the name change.

We live currently about 40 miles away from London (Dh's job is pretty near) Our house is nice and we have been incredibly lucky to buy in an area where to our amazement our houses value almost quadrupled (nothing we did, just very jammy) The area is rather quite, perhaps dull but we have settled into family life with a nice set of friends and a good local pub.

Anyway DH has decided he really really wants to move back to London, he really misses the buzz of the place and never really settled here. I think if it had just been him and I then I would have seriously considered it (however the last time I lived in London was 8 years ago whilst at uni)We have a 2 year old toddler to consider and we are trying for another baby now.

Would we be crazy to move back?
Would we get a decent sized house in a nice area for the money ours is worth? (670k)
Are the good schools packed out?
Am I bananas to be even thinking about this?

i used to spend most weekend in tottenham, well the pleasure rooms lol.

I would love to live in London. Went to University there and worked in Camberwell for 3 very happy years. Sadly, dh would never consider it and looking at those prices we will never be able to afford it . I say go for it-nothing has to be permanent so if you really hate it you can move again

Cor, for that money, you could get a really rather splendid place round where I live. And lovely neighbours, obviously

LOL dh is a season ticket holder (have trained dd from the age of two to respond to the question "who do you support?" with "arsenal" .

I know croydon isn't the most fashioable but lookhere

MI, where is that?
Thanks for that PC and bubble I used to love Hoddle and Ricky Villar and not forgetting Ossie Ardilles! memories!

Ahem, Catford. Not glamorous. Near Lewisham.

Hmmm, how splendid are we talking, never lived in splendour before

We too live in Kent though a bit further out than you. Beautiful but boring (and in the bottom 4% of cultural access nationally according to Ofsted). Life doesn't really happen much round here - maybe because this SE corner is so close to London. I really miss it - we moved here from Bickley (Bromley) and I so wish we hadn't. I'd move back there tomorrow.

Noooooooo, don't move to Croydon, whatever you do! It sucks.

Ok I have to stop looking now as am starting to swoon at some houses. It's fatal looking online.

Sheen, Richmond and Ham are all lovely areas if you like a slightly countryfied feel and good schools.

Sheen a bit cheaper than Richmond

how about
this

or
this

or Southfields/Wandworth nice

here or here

Dont forget you will have to pay £27k stamp duty!

East Dulwich
Balham (handy for Graveney)
Herne Hill
Blackheath
Clapham (veering Graveney sort of catchment, or Bonneville and Clapham Manor primary are both v well liked)

You need to think carefully about transport routes to DH's work.

Why is your husband leaning towards East London IWJW? Does he expect to be working at Canary Wharf or the City?

I'm living in Docklands atm and it's the first place I've lived in London that I haven't wanted to move on after a couple of years. I really love it here and it's especially good for pre-schoolers here. However schools are not great, especially secondary and we are thinking of moving back to Dublin for ds' secondary eduction. Also there aren't that many large family homes and houses tend to be tall and narrow with lots of stairs.

Am going to have a peek at Southfields and Wimbledon too. Richmond is way too pricey, although it looks really fabulous.

Bran - DH thought that with the improvements being made for the Olympics that East end could be a good punt property wise.

I'm not as keen as him, he is very excited that I am researching anyway.

I think if I see a house and fall in love with it, that may persuade me to do it. That would be step number one for me.

I lived in Ealing and its a lovely place. Not smack bang wallop in the city but close enough to have good access. That was about 6 years ago though, so I dont know what the prices are like now.

Have just skimmed. Ealing is nice, I went to school there, lots of tubes and it really IS London (not like Twickers etc).

There could be money to be made in the East End, but this will be your family home so I think that will be quite far down your list of priorities. I've been here for 5 years and we've probably only made about 25% growth on our flat (a new build) because there is so much development going on here. The properties that have had the most growth have been the old dockers houses because there is a limited supply of them and they have nice big gardens, I would guess that they have almost doubled in the last 5 years and they had rapid price growth before that as well. So if you do move to an area where you expect rapid development and a lot of new builds then try buying the prettiest old house you can find and do it up.

Bran, that's what we did here. Took a beautiful wreck that nobody else was interested in and did it up. It took years and there were no kids involved I'm not sure I have the stomach or the jeart to do that now though.