How do I decide between Bristol & London (Hither Green)?

[BipBippadotta]

DH and I are at something of a life crossroads and need a big change. We are moving from our London neighbourhood which has bad / sad associations for us, and want to find somewhere we can have a nice quality of life, which for us means:

• more space (ideally 4 bedrooms)
• nice walks / parks / woodland nearby
• not an eye-watering commute
• minimal depressing urban scumminess (fly-tipping, drunk men fighting in the street, etc)
• access to friends / like-minded people
• a couple of nice pubs / restaurants nearby

*NB - no children (can't have them) so schools are not a consideration.

We have our eye on a huge, lovely house in Hither Green / Lewisham. It would be the house of my dreams, if it weren't near the scumminess of Lewisham High Street, hostage to a station where trains are few & far between, and impossible to get to from N / NE London, where most of our friends are. This place suits our budget if we sell up.

A more radical option we've been considering is moving to Bristol. DH can work remotely, and my job is portable. We could just about afford to buy a good sized period house in Montpelier, and hang on to our London house and rent it out. We've got our eye on a nice house on a little wonky street with a lovely view. Needs a bit of work (which we wouldn't immediately have cash for).

We can't for the life of us decide what to do & are trying to balance what would be a sound financial decision with what will bring us pleasure.

Pros of the Bristol plan:

• near lovely countryside
• can live somewhere nice & away from hideous London squalor
• can have a rental property in London which is a good long-term investment

Cons:

• only a couple of friends there
• further from airports (my family lives abroad)
• lower earning potential if we change our current contracts
• will be quite skint for a while

So I suppose what I'm asking is:

• is Bristol as nice to live in as I imagine it will be?
• is being a landlord a massive faff / worth the payoff?

If you live in Bristol, do you like it? Is it easy to make friends there (if you have no children & work at home)?

If you live in Hither Green / Lewisham, are there lovely aspects to it I'm missing?

Help me decide!

Oh and within a 10 min walk of my house I have Mountsfield Park, Lewisham Park, Manor House gardens, Manor Park, Ladywell Fields. It's very green. Hilly Fields is about 15 mins and Blackheath 30. Greenwich also v easy on bus and trains out to Kent in no time.

Hi Op with your budget would look at forest hill/brockley or Beckenham much nicer than hither green which is a bit 'bitty' no proper high street & you have to go to Lewisham or lee for food shopping, traffic pretty awful too, charlton has fab Victorian houses, but it's a long way out & again not to much in the way of facilities.
Dont know Bristol, so cant comment

I live in HG and have to say it has the nicest bunch of people I have ever met in London. Really good community. The primary schools are also ace and there's a new state secondary opening which will offer IB, if that's important to you.Easier than you would think to get to NE London if you change at New x and get on East London Line.

Personally given a free hand I would leave London tho. But I don't know if I would go to Bristol - we used to visit friends of ours there a lot and it just rained the whole bloody time...

Hello. Bristol is a great city! I moved here almost 20 years ago after I graduated. I had lived in London for 3 months but it wasn't for me long term. I love it here. We now live in a lovely village about 20 mins outside the city but I travel in every day. As others have posted the traffic is awful here but the city more than compensates for it. Beautiful buildings, history, maritime heritage, restaurants, theatres everything you could miss in London is here too! It is a green city with easy access to the beach, the countryside and the motorway! Also Bristol Airport flies Internationally. Hope you find what you are looking for.

Glorious that 3 bed in Montpelier is the one I'm looking at! Viewed it last weekend and loved it.

I'm noticing people like Hither Green because of family friendliness & leave Bristol because of the schools - this makes Bristol seem more & more the place for an old infertile couple like DH and me. Really don't want to be in nappy valley as it's quite painful for us & a good part of why we're fleeing e17. Shit schools are a definite bonus.

Montpelier itself isn't leafy but most of Bristol is. At the moment we are so far from leaves you can forget what they are.

With your budget I think the Blackheath house would be good. It's not large but it's on a lovely road, near loads of open space, villagey feel but good for getting in to town.

OP Hither Green is increasingly like nappy valley. There is plenty going on that doesn't involve kids but according to our estate agent one of the main reasons people are moving to the area is to start a family and because of the good schools.. there are tonnes of kids here.

And I know I am biased as it is my home but it isn't a shithole. It really isn't.

I think you might find HG painful then Bip. It is pretty much nappy valley for the working in arts/aid/media/education rather than banking posse...

But then, that means there are lots of MumsNetters too!

Have lived in Lewisham for a bit and near Bristol. No comparison - Bristol. However, I have kids, so that makes a difference. London's a short trip on the train though - not far in the car. You haven't said your age ...

Oh I love that Montpelier one. Live there!

That sounds like exactly the demographic in e17 a couple of years ago (though swiftly changing as the aid / education workers get priced out)

I'm 39 - so no spring chicken but not ready to be put out to pasture just yet (hence Bristol over Kent). DH is 42. He lived in Bristol in the 90s and part of what we like about it is there are parts of the city where the 90s live on! Lots of slightly crusty elements that take us back to our carefree youth. And by the looks of things there are a fair few other childless couples out & about having a nice time, and some spaces left that are just for grown-ups. We went to a couple of pubs and were stunned to find they weren't full of NCT groups - and yet also not too stabby. You tend to get one or the other in our neck of the woods: baby sensory classes or terrifying toothless men with big dogs.

I think maybe you have your answer Bip

Would you consider renting in Bristol for a while so you can make sure it's for you?

I think if you were asking for the pros and consists of Hither Green vs. Forest Hill or Brockley it would be much of a muchness. But HG and Bristol are so different and Bristol sounds as though it for you!

Just for the record, Bristol secondary schools are much improved in the last few years. Colston's Girls and the Cathedral School are both former private schools doing very well in the state sector and there are also good schools such as Cotham, Redland Green and the Free School. In fact state education is doing so well that far fewer children are being privately educated and some private schools are struggling.

Gah! How did so many Londoners find out about Montpelier? It's rubbish, no need for you to come here 😉

Oh I love that Montpelier one. Live there!

I prefer the Exeter Road, Southville one - more substantial house. I know nothing about the location tho.

The Southville one you can go up into the loft in a few years if you want to / had the money to.

Ah, but you can go into the loft on the Montpelier one, too! And it's huge! But Southville's also nice & better garden for the cats.

Could rent in Bristol for a bit, though I worry our cats would make us an unattractive prospect for landlords. It was really hard to find someone to rent to us in London when we only had 1 cat... and now we've got 3.

Some landlords are cool though. I rented in Bristol and had 2 cats for 12 years with no problems.

Renting definitely makes sense if you don't really know the areas and want to get a feel before you commit. However, when you know the areas, I don't really see the point especially as property prices are rising ...

I bought a flat a year ago in BS6, randomly bumped into the EA who sold it to me last week, he reckons it's gone up nearly 10% in price since then, just bear that in mind as you are thinking about what to do as all of these areas are uber popular at the moment.

OP, do take a look at Bath - lovely, lots of culture, fab places to eat and shop and a really good mix of age groups, not suffocatingly nappy valley. A really beautiful small city with lots to offer. Have lived and worked in both Bristol and Bath and have no desire to reprise the Bristol experience. Bath is expensive but not London prices.

Ooh I'm intrigued, Dancing - what was the Bristol experience that doesn't bear reprising?

See I was going to be all helpful till I saw you refer to Lewisham as scummy

How very DARE you

Have a look in Ladywell? It's nicer than HG Imo. Feels less on the edge of London

Don't think we can afford Ladywell, I'm afraid. It was Lewisham High Street that I meant was scummy - not all of Lewisham by any means!

Dancingtothemusicoftime I wouldn't want to live in Bath without children - it is a small and insular city and it seems like OP wants something more edgy. I love Bristol for its diversity.