Do you live in Thornton Heath and like it?

[MrBobLoblaw]

DP and I are about to put our flat on the market and we're currently living in Crystal Palace with toddler DS. I'm pregnant and we have massively outgrown our one bed. We love it here and ideally would stay in CP but there's no way we could afford the 3 bed we need with our budget here.

We've been considering Beckenham, penge, Sydenham etc as we have family in CP so really want to stay nearby. This property has come up on the CP side of Thornton Heath -
www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-79683851.html I think it has loads of potential and isn't it bad nick as is (though downstairs bathroom is a bit of a turnoff). However my perception of TH is that it's a bit of a shit hole and the property is in a transport hole (a mile to TH station and even further to CP).

I'd love any local knowhow please. I'm going to view it next week so will get a feel of the area for myself. Also all opinions welcome on the house itself! I think it's ripe for a back extension and loft extension (though we wouldn't be able to afford to do that for a long while) and could be made more homely in the short term.

Thanks in advance. Feeling pretty nervous about getting on the property market at the moment but we've got a baby deadline now to spur us on!

I lived in West Croydon / Selhurst / Thornton Heath area. Moved to the Beckenham end of Shirley and it’s much nicer for families. Managed a 3 bed terrace for £350k

Thanks again everyone. Lots of useful info here. Looks like TH will be given a very wide birth from us.

Had a look at the Eden park house which looked good and I hadn't considered that area or know it well so I'll take a look. We've only got £400k to play with really so it's proving a bit difficult!

The south Norwood flat is nice but we're in a flat atm so we're trying to see if we can get a house for our money first. I've had enough of carrying the buggy plus a baby up the stairs and with soon to be 2 kids it would be nice to know we don't have any below/above neighbours to worry about regarding noise.

We're avoiding Croydon if I'm honest as DP has it on his no go list but I will take a look anyway as I think we'd be stupid to not consider it. We've been spoilt in Crystal Palace to be honest. The gorgeous park, triangle and transport links have been awesome so I think it's going to be a hard lesson in compromise for us.

Having read all the negative comments, I thought I’d add something a (little) more positive! I’m in South Norwood, but the top end, close to Thornton Heath so know it pretty well. I was in your position 4 years ago, having rented quite happily in Crystal Palace but in need of space to accommodate a growing family and wanting the security of home ownership rather than renting forever more.

We really wanted a house rather than a flat and settled on SN as it was still close to CP where we’d made a lot of friends and felt very at home. Four years on, I don’t regret it. Yes the area has some dodgy parts and I find the run down look of a lot of it quite depressing – litter, fly tipping etc. – but it has improved a lot in that short time and the space we have now makes up for the longer journey to CP.

The house you initially posted about is not in a great location transport-wise but Norwood Junction and Thornton Heath stations are both well connected. There are regular, fast trains to Victoria from TH and a really quick option to London Bridge from Norwood Junction, plus the Overground.

The area can feel quite rough but I have the nicest neighbours of anywhere I’ve lived in London (over 18 years). There are lots of lovely parks, decent leisure centres in TH and SN and a fantastic British Gymnastics Club in TH. The Council have spent a lot of money on High Street improvements in TH and it looks and feels a lot nicer.

Having said all of that, if I could pick up my house and drop it a mile up the hill into CP I absolutely would, but this is London (just about!) and unless you have a lot of money, you have to compromise on certain things.

Good luck with your search!

I’d also like to give a more positive view. We moved to TH last year for pretty much the same reasons: love Crystal Palace, can’t afford to buy there. We’re at the very top, not far from the house you linked, and we only ever go to TH to catch the train (where you always get a seat into Victoria at rush hour). We spend most of our time in Crystal Palace, which is a pleasant (if uphill!) walk.

There are great local organisations like the Thornton Heath Chronicle and Thornton Heath Community Action Team which are always putting on new community initiatives. There’s definitely an effort to improve the area through investment, most recently a new town square design which is about to be finalised, to be built in front of the station.

Grangewood Park is great, and if you’re green fingered, at this end of TH you’re in priority catchment for Spa Hill allotments, where we’ve met really lovely people.

There were worse problems with crime where we moved from in SE23, and you can get houses with original features and decent gardens in TH for the price of a flat in CP. The southern end of TH is definitely more run down it’s true, but I wouldn’t tar the whole area with the same brush.

Thank you @LemonDifficulty and @Faust52. Really interesting to hear the opposing view! And actually re-reading the thread many of the other posters moved out many years ago. Maybe it's still worth viewing the place just to get a feel for myself. Do either of you feel like there's lots to do with your DC locally? Atm I'm spoilt for playgroups in CP and penge/Anerley.

It's a hard balancing act between location and property size isn't it? We'd be a 15 min walk from my MIL at the linked property (a good thing in my case!) so there's definitely that to contend with. I also currently live at the bottom of one of CPs hills and managed it at 41 weeks pregnant so I feel like I can't ever complain about the hills now I know I did it then!

Afraid we don’t have kids so I can’t really comment on that... But we’ve had a flyer through the door this afternoon to say they’re now going to be closing a local road to traffic once a month so children can play freely if that’s any indication!

The fact that so many of the negative posts were from people who’d lived in TH years ago is largely what prompted me to post as I think a lot has changed, even in the few years I’ve been here.

I still use CP as my main destination for my DC as well as for myself and am less than 30mins walk away (faster back down the hill on the way home ) but there are an ever increasing number of things going on in TH and SN. There’s a decent sports centre which runs Tumble Tots sessions and has a good pool, great gymnastics club and some good parks. @Faust52 mentioned Grangewood Park which is my nearest and much used green space and a Woodcraft Folk group has recently been set up.

You’re right about the balancing act and ultimately you need to decide whether space or location is most important to you. For us, having lived in a beautiful but very noisy flat in a Victorian conversion, we were adamant we wanted a house and a garden for our DC.

It was always a bit of a pit. But it’s sort of “up and coming” now I hear?
Have you thought about east Croydon? I grew up in one of these, you can’t see any pictures but ours was on this road and nice. We had a loft conversion So had 3 bed + study. Your budget would possibly stretch? I mean it’s by no means as fab as Cp but an improvement on TH xxxxx

Just realised I didn’t attach the house

www.zoopla.co.uk/for-sale/details/49791789?search_identifier=dd2cff98b64b235a01180d710d0e9f0e

Also that Thornton Heath house is gorgeous. Looks really lovely in the photos. I’m going to drop DSis a text, she’s in south Norwood but works in TH and her boyfriend lives on the road behind this one. I’ll see how she finds it.

I would avoid TH, it’s still a bit of a tip and lots of gang issues

Agree with purley etc

Agree with Grangewood Park being lovely and my daughter goes to the gymnastic place mentioned and there's a really good nursery next to it.

www.purplebricks.co.uk/property-for-sale/3-bedroom-terraced-house-thornton-heath-573643

This house is actually my friends house and is one road over from the one you posted but the street is quieter because it doesn't get the buses or the school traffic.

Another TH resident here. We are by Grangewood Park and have been for 5 years. When we moved from Peckham I thought we'd made an awful mistake but now I love it. Yes, there's some dodgy areas but (as we experienced in Peckham) if you're not in the gangs you're not that affected by them.
Also GP playground has just been selected for full replacement so will be even better for kids within a year or so.

I have a mate who lives on that bit of the road and I'm just up in CP, moved here from
norbury. I wouldn't call that side of Parchmore Rd properly Thornton Heath. It's right to the Americas estate which is nice enough and as a pp said you can get the 450 to CP easily and never go near TH, although you can get the 450 there to just for the train station. It looks a bit rough around the edges but really isn't that bad. However with 400k I'd be tempted to make cheeky offers on the houses for sale that bit higher up Spa Hill and Beauchamp Rd that are on for 420ish. Then you're closer to Beulah Hill and everything gets nicer.

Went to view the house today. Needs a lot more work than I thought but it deffo had good bones. Someone with a lot more money than us could do a great job of renovating or will turn it in to two flats it but we have neither the time nor money for that much work I don't think. The estate agent was really realistic tbf and, believe or not, pretty honest.

As for that slice of TH, I didn't hate it like I thought I might, but it did feel a bit no mans land-y in the sense that nothing was convenient. Couldn't see a local shop anywhere and it was a schlep away from the train station and CP. But it's not fully off the radar for now.

Thanks everyone for the input.. the search continues!

That's an odd impression amenities-wise. There's a newsagent and chippy and such on Northwood Rd v near that house and close to the primary school, a gym a bit further down and a whole bank of stores including a Co-op, Nisa and many others plus a pub at the junction with Green Lane. As well as the Harvester at the top of Spa Hill. But if it's too expensive/too much work, guess it's a non-starter anyway.

Ah well that's good to know actually @pinkdelight. Thanks for letting me know. Tbh I only came in/went out via the spa hill/Beulah hill way so I guess I didn't really see a good representation.

We've got so much choice of shops and restaurants where we are now so it's always going to be less than we have now if you know what I mean, but it's all part of the compromise. I'm hoping to find a place that needs less work in that area, like the one PP posted of her friends house, as I think that might be better suited.

Sorry, I know this is a few days old but just wanted to add my tuppenth, which is a bit different to some others experience.
We moved away from Thornton Heath 3 ish years ago after living there around 5 years.
Generally we liked the area, I didn’t see a lot of evidence of crime or gangs, although I’m guessing they were there in common with many areas in London. A huge pub at the end of our road was closed after a massive raid a couple of weeks after we moved in, which probably helped.
Yes, the high street is completely run down, although since we left a Costa and a couple of shops that look ok have opened.
Good things - 2 big parks, a lovely library with lots of groups for children, a community garden, a big leisure centre, a couple of nice playgroups and children’s centres, a gymnastics club and cricket club, great links to central London.
I feel that the area slowly improved all the time we were there and continues to do so. It was in the news just after we moved away as being the place that property prices increased the most that year. I’ve also noticed there’s now a Thornton Heath Arts week.
It probably depends what you want, there’s not a lot there and it isn’t perfect but only a quick bus ride or 30 min walk from Crystal Palace or Croydon. I would view the house and have a look round the area, it’s probably not for everyone but personally I wouldn’t completely rule it out.

I second the comment on Addiscombe. It has excellent transport links (tram to East Croydon - the tram is superior to the bus and the tube) and none of the safety issues of neighboring areas like South Norwood, Thornton Heath. It's also a short hop to Crystal Palace where we spend a lot of time on the weekends. House prices are reasonable for what you get. We moved here two years ago and have seen more and more professionals moving in since.