Moving from London to Kent.

[frolicmum]

I posted on here the other day and it seems I won't be able to afford the house I really want in London - outskirts aka Bromley, chislehurst, beckenham.

Who has moved from London to Kent (lovely new builds in Marden - the sticks, really!)

Anyone been there done that? Please tell me the good and bad x

I would really recommend a road trip to Marden. While it looks good on Google Streetview and doesn't look too far from everything, when you actually drive there it feels absolutely miles away from everything!

The new builds going up around there are causing much anger amongst locals and the traffic that will result will make what are already slow roads even slower.

Have a look at Coxheath area. There's a fair amount of new builds around there but a bit closer to civilisation.

This is in Horsemonden and I love it! I don't know the area particularly well though - Horsemonden

Marden really is the pits - sorry, I was being restrained earlier

And Hadlow - as a poster referred to above - is very pretty.

I know a couple who moved from the outskirts of London to Marden less than 3 years ago. They’re currently looking to move back in.

We're going to leave DS at the in laws Saturday afternoon and will have a look at a few places in Kent.

@Globalpandemicmum is their house up for sale? Joking! 😂

Eden ridge is just a giant housing estate these days. Horrible.

You could get a 5 bed in Bromley around 800, or look at Petti wood / Orpington direction.

Have you considered just over the border into East Sussex? Crowborough and surrounding arras for example?
You could get a beautifully 'done' 4 bed with scope for a loft conversion? 4 beds are always going to be easier to come by than 5 beds
The new build you saw I don't think is well thought through in terms of space-only 2 rooms downstairs but 5 bedrooms? Would expect more downstairs living space tbh

Properties are flying in Folkestone as more and more people move out , but this is similar to the sort of thing we got as an alternative to Chislehurst and other areas in SE London we were considering. www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-91675286.html
We love it. DH stills gets to London and back with similar commute times, And I think our kids get far more out of living here than they would there - we still pop up for museums, etc - kids travel on HS1 for a quid 😁

I used to live in Staplehurst (next "village" to Marden) More trains stop there but they are build, build, building and the village will soon be 8000 people strong. With very few facilities. Now, in some ways this doesn't matter: I used a great (private) dentist in Cranbrook, hardly used the health centre and did my shopping online or in Maidstone. There was a fair amount of community stuff going on, and the pub was nice - but in the 10 years I lived there 4 other village pubs shut. On the good side, it was only 45 minutes to Rye Harbour, which is very pretty seaside. It totally depends on what you want - do lots of homework!

Interesting, thanks everyone.

We are having our house valued on Friday and I know I could potentially get something for 800k where I started looking initially but this is the absolute max and it would be stretch. We just turned 30 and bought our first property at 27 as we didn't manage to save quicker whilst renting in London. We do have good jobs but not earning crazy amounts, both are pretty good with money though, not big spenders.

It would be good to get our house valued to see what we are getting for it. I'm hoping that we may make like 10-15k on it to cover the fees to buy a new one and sell this one.

After that, I will also book viewings for new eltham / eltham / Bromley to see what we can get for around 700 here. I would only spend 800 it completely wowed me which I can't imagine to be honest.

@Freeamigos what a house - looks amazing & I see what you mean.

I hope the above post is a weird joke but I've reported it to MNHQ anyway and to the Plain English Campaign

I cannot believe anyone would be idiotic enough to post their full name, phone number, job title and home address online.

Have you at west wickham/Eden park areas prices in beckenham seem over optimistic I see a lot come back on rightmove reduced after a couple of weeks.

Rochester is lovely - and I say that as a DfL and mancunian . I’ve just moved here and not looking back. Great to get into London for work and houses are great