Safe place for fresh french family

[DocThor]

Hi,

My wife, our 3 months old baby (girl), our dog and I are moving to London soon - I will start to work on 15th January (at UCL, center London).
We are both french. My wife is not fully comfortable with english and she won't work in order to take care of our baby. So we are looking for a nice, safe place to live. We like green areas (for walks with baby + dog) and don't need to have plenty of bars and night clubs close. Just some local amenities.
As we wish to have a garden and avoid too long commute time to work (30min would be perfect, 45min cool, 1h max), but we have no expendable budget (1400£/month top max), I selected some interesting areas :

Woodford/Buckhurst Hill
Cheshunt
New Barnet
Edgware/Mill Hill/Colindale
Borehamwood

But I have never been in these place !
Would some of you have advice/experience with these areas ?

I really thank you in advance for your help !!

Don't go to Borehamwood, it's bloody awful!! Barnet is nice, and within M25 so easier as a commute...probably more there for your wife to do in terms of baby groyps etc. Mill Hill also lovely, but expensive.

Have you looked at Welwyn Garden City? Parts of Hatfield are also ok but the town centre is grim. WGC has lots of amenities, very pretty, good place for families and rent is cheaper than London.

I'm guessing you are academic. Postdoc or more senior?

£1400 is not much and you will need to consider doing a longer commute if you want a nice family area with a garden etc.

Lots of French people live around Ravenscourt Park in London but your budget won’t stretch to that, sadly.

The easy commute to work will be along either branch of the Northern Line. Not the cheapest areas but you would be ok in Barnet but most areas on this line are expensive. Your other bet would be commuting into Euston. This opens up Hertfordshire. Therefore look at Tring and Leighton Buzzard in Bedfordshire. You would be in budget but not in London. Obviously a longer commute but more for your money. Berkhamsted is great but not sure of your budget there. It’s closer to London and the best place to live and commute in my view.

I say this endlessly on here but South London is lovely for green space and more affordable than north!

An example: www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-87201794.html

Sandwiched between Brockwell Park and Streatham and Tooting Commons. Loads of stuff for parents of young kids, and a 35/40 min commute for you - bus to Brixton then straight up the Victoria line to Warren St (the Victoria line is much nicer than the northern line, and I say that who has commuted on one or the other for the past 10 years!)

If you’re happy with an apartment and being outside London, St Albans would probably suit your wife. There are baby groups for French speaking families and lots of accessible dog walks. It’s a very family friendly place. However, the travel to central London may eat into your accommodation budget as it’s not a particularly cheap place. . .

Good luck with the move!

check train fares as part of this - you might get quite a shock! Annual season St Albans to London is £3612 and will go up in January.

also recent law changes capping deposits mean landlords will be less keen to allow pets. Your dog will limit your choice of rentals.

that suggestion of south London looks good.

There’s a fast train between Canterbury and kings cross, which is then a very manageable walk to UCL. Canterbury is a nice city with some very good schools both primary and secondary. It has a lovely farmers markat and a cute park (west gate gardens) It would mean quite a lot of commuting for you though. Maybe you could work from home a coup,e of days a week? You could rent a house with that budget.

I don’t know North London we’ll enogh to comment on the areas but can recommend my neck of the woods - the borough of Sutton. It’s one of the most affordable areas in London but also the safest borough in London with an international mix of people. It’s a very, very popular area for families and tons to do with babies and children. There are some lovely parks and you can walk to the coutryside from parts of the borough with stations being in zones 4 and 5 so easy and affordable commuting.

I'll just mention that if you are trying to rent a house with a dog your options will be much reduced.
A lot of landlords will not consider pets and a lot of apartment blocks won't allow them either.

St Alban's is lovely but pricey.
Mill hill is nice but expensive.
New Barnet is not nice but is safe.

Most places off the northern line would be a stretch on your budget I would have thought but they should be okay to live in.
But as I said I would search for dog friendly first in budget and take it from there.

Have you considered Highams Park? I’m assuming you would be travelling to Warren St? Train/tube between the 2 is about 30 mins. You are right alongside Epping Forest and have a large park and lake for dog walking. Nice community feel and tonnes of young families, loads of mum and baby activities and some French speakers. Dependant on getting a landlord to take pets you could rent a garden flat for around your budget I think.

Try south London, it's a bit cheaper usually. You won't get much choice with a dog

That’s a small budget for London housing. Given the garden wishes and dog, commuting and going into a station on that side of the city might be better.

South London inconvenient for UCL?

Herts commuter rail line is £££ as a PP says. Rail prices really vary.

Congratulations on the job!

Buckhurst Hill is meant to be lovely. But there is a big french community around UCL. If you consider commuting costs it’s actually often cheaper to live there and there are some great green spaces right in Bloomsbury - including corams fields where you can only go with a child. If you’re a visiting academic look at the lists for your university, also maybe worth contacting Goodenough College to see if they have space. The community around Bloomsbury is very nice, also Camden for UCL, etc.

(You won’t be able to afford a garden in these places but to be honest, a garden will really limit your options).

But sadly DocThor is unlikely to be able to live in Bloomsbury on that budget. I used to rent a 2 bed flat there and dropped in on my old haunt to check the rent a couple of years ago. It was £2100 pcm .

Being near a park is probably more achievable than having a garden.

You need to take commuting costs into account for your budget, because some places further out with decent trains have much more expensive season tickets than being on the tube.

There might be UCL noticeboard?

Finchley Central or East Finchley would be perfect - on the Northern Line. Loads of property with communal gardens and many local well resourced parks for walks with the baby. You would have a wide choice of 2 bed flats within your budget.
And a 20minute commute to work.

The dog may be an issue.
www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-83958686.html#_full-description

Buckhurst Hill/Woodford is lovely (used to live there) but you will struggle to get anywhere really nice within that budget, certainly not near the station. You also have to consider the travel cost, not cheap. I agree with PP, think about somewhere on a fast train line and go a bit further out to a nice area outside of the London area and accept your commute may be a little over the hour.

Wow ! So much messages ! And so quickly ! Thank you very much !!!
I've got a lot of options now. I've discovered new ones thank to you all.

To answer some of your questions - yes, I am a post-doc (in Chemistry). I've been awarded a Marie-Curie fellowship so we'll be here for 2 years.

At the beginning we planned to make a colocation with my cousin who lives in North-East. So that's why I focused on almost central North and East North London.
But some of you mentionned South London and West areas and I admit I have to take a look. And I've read that East part (Illford, Dagenham...) of London is not really safe. So finally we don't want to be so close to my cousin anymore :)

Among your suggestions, Welwyn Garden City, Berkhamsted and St Albans can be very good indeed !
Bloomsburry would be very nice but it's too expensive.
Lozza70 mentionned Highams Park and effectively it seems to be quite perfect for us. I checked Buckurst Hill and Woodford which are, I guess, in the same idea. So I will definitely take a look at Highams Park.

I am aware that our criterias are complex (unreal !?).

But I precise that I considered a budget of 1400£ without taxes. And 30min commute would be perfect but realistically, I am ok with 1h commute if it allows a nice and safe area. This may open-up some options...
I did found some places checking all our criterias. But as you mentionned, the dog is very often an issue... (this was unexpected for us as we heard that dogs were very famous in UK).

The last problem is that it is hard to arrange viewing in advance.
So I will come to London next week from Tuesday evening to Friday afternoon and try to make a maximum of viewings.

I will definitely take into account all your suggestions, but it will be complicated to visit so spreaded areas. I will have to make a choice first.

Thank you very much again for all the answers I already get !!!
(No one talked about Cheshunt and Woodford. It is not good ? :) )

Cheshunt is on the fast line into Liverpool
St. One stop at Tottenham Hale and it's 20 minutes.

You will get something nice, with driveway and garden for your budget.

I live in Broxbourne (next small town to Cheshunt) we have a zoo, woodland, lovely green areas, dog friendly country pubs. Its definitely worth looking at

It’s very, very difficult to rent in London with a pet so I suggest starting your search as soon as possible.