Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Property/DIY

Join our Property forum for renovation, DIY, and house selling advice.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Original poster

Zone 1-3 people, where do you live?

120 replies

msrisotto · 20/03/2013 22:12

And do you earn millions and millions? Or live in the tiniest of flats?? I would love to live in zones 1-3 and have money that would buy me a palace in some places but sadly not in London....

OP posts:

Original poster

msrisotto · 21/03/2013 15:28

Thank you everyone for enlightening me!

However I have come to the unfortunate self discovery that I must be a bit of a snob because I have a bit of a south London block in my mind. Although it may be because it would take me from within an ok distance from my family to a 'see them twice a year' kind of distance. At the moment I do like my family so that would be a problem.

OP posts:

bigTillyMint · 21/03/2013 16:52

Crossing London from where we live to the M1/M4/M40 takes about an hour and we are probably in the furthest away zone 2 area from those London gateways. Does that make it into a twice a year kind of distance?

Original poster

msrisotto · 21/03/2013 17:00

Well it's an hour and a half from Harrow, zone 5, NW where I am now, so it sounds like it would then be 2.5-3 hours in total?

OP posts:

Original poster

msrisotto · 21/03/2013 17:01

Maybe it's already 2 hours, I can't remember. Depends on traffic of course.

OP posts:

miaowmix · 21/03/2013 17:04

Peckham, zone 2, love it, have a house but like others I bought in the 90s when nobody wanted to live here. Now it is in danger of becoming too trendy and the new Dalston. It has certainly up and come, most 3 beds in my neghbourhood go for c. £600k.

bigTillyMint · 21/03/2013 17:49

3 hours is a twice a year journey?!

Original poster

msrisotto · 21/03/2013 19:25

Lol, well it would mean that they'd virtually never come to me, I would always have to go to them so obviously i'd see them more than twice a year but it'd piss me off that I was always the one making the effort.

OP posts:

Original poster

msrisotto · 21/03/2013 19:25

Oh god just realised I said lol, bit of a mn crime isn't it? Sorry!

OP posts:

ScreamingFoxtrots · 21/03/2013 19:55

The A406 is a known barrier to parents visiting grown up children in London. My in-laws live just outside the M25 and have visited us here once in 6 years! It's a price worth paying in my eyes

Seriously, have a look south of the river, you may be pleasantly surprised!

Mintyy · 21/03/2013 19:57

Well hello Tilly .

Iknowwhatyouredoing · 22/03/2013 01:11

We live in zone 1, about 5min from Warren St in an ex-LA flat. Definitely not millionaires here , it was £300k when we bought in 2010 but probably increased a fair bit since then, despite being in a tower block. Looks brutalist from the outside but it's actually very spacious, we have lovely neighbours and a great community. Two beds but far more space than modern builds, and we just have one DS so it suits us well.

Love being able to walk to work, and making use of London's shopping and amenities without rushing back for a last train!

Goodwordguide · 22/03/2013 08:51

Sounds great Iknow - if we had one 1 DC I would definitely try and live right in the centre. I love those Barbican-esque flats.

VinegarDrinker · 22/03/2013 08:53

Me and DH want to live in the Barbican when we turf out the kids. Love it there :) . I went to the Barbican playgroup back in the day and graduated there too.

Goodwordguide · 22/03/2013 09:31

Would love to 'retire' to the Barbican when the children finally leave home - love wandering round the City at the weekend and the JG Ballard vibe...

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 12:46

Live in Shepherd's Bush. Pay £40k a year in rent.

We are each individually on the top rung of our anti-social, high-stress-low-satisfaction but therefore well-paid professions.

We are moving out of London because we can't afford to buy in the kind of area we feel comfortable living in.

This is why Lonbdon is fucked: you can only live here if you do so with an inheritance, a tax dodge, or benefits.

Iknowwhatyouredoing · 22/03/2013 12:51

We didn't have any of those mrsH1974 . Nor are we at the top of our professions (we just do bog-standard jobs really). But I dare say our council estate might be somewhere that a Shepherd's Bush resident might not feel comfortable in. We were a bit unsure about it at first, but we swallowed our prejudices and we've never had any problems living here.

It's not as nice (or expensive) as living in the Barbican either!

VinegarDrinker · 22/03/2013 12:59

So all of us on this thread are tax dodgers or have inherited money? Erm, right...

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 13:00

We are not from London originally, Iknowwhat so admittedly we don't really have a very well developed tolerance level for people pissed and fighty in the middle of the afternoon .

It's gutting to be working this hard in a job I don't much like to have to pay £40k a year to live in a very convenient but not especially nice street, with no garden.

Yes, I could afford to buy on a council estate, and perhaps I AM a snob for not wanting to live there. But when you're contibuting six figures to the exchequer each year, there's something disheartening about realising you're paying for your next door neighbours to stay home all day and smoke weed on the doorstep.

HolyMackerel · 22/03/2013 13:01

mrsH1974 we didn't have any of those and have a modest income, but we moved from N London (Crouch end area) to SE London to an area where we could afford to buy - it really is not that scary and we are very comfortable here.

If you can afford £40k in rent a year you could buy in a pretty fab area (much trendier than my neck of the woods) in London no problem.

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 13:02

Vinegar How did you buy your house? When did you buy your house?

HolyMackerel · 22/03/2013 13:05

Oh dear, if you are paying 6 figures in tax mrsH you can certainly afford to buy in London. My neighbours are v middle class and have never smoked weed on the doorstep though I smelt something funny in the back garden once

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 13:05

Holy What you're saying makes a lot of sense but I work unsocial hours (am often at my desk at 6am or still working at 2am because of time differences) so need to live centrally.

Beyond zone 2 you're adding 2 hours a day in commuting and even that's impossible if your working day doesn't end until the last train has long left.

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 13:06

Six figures combined between us in tax. Individually would be a different story .

HolyMackerel · 22/03/2013 13:14

It may be the case that you cannot afford to buy very close to wherever you work, in central London, and that is the case for most Londoners. That's not the same as everyone who has managed to buy in London being a tax dodger etc.

We live in zone 3, my DH works in central London, and he has a 30 minute commute door to door.

mrsH1974 · 22/03/2013 13:18

I'll ask the same question: when did you buy?

We arrived in London in 2004 and the big price rises began in 2005.

If you bought less than a decade ago you're laughing, if you didn't, you aren't.

It doesn't matter how far you live from the centre, Holy, it matters whether you can actually get to work for the hours that you work.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5