Buying a house in Leicester

[Isthisanokname]

It looks like I might end up moving to Leicester for work and I'm looking for advice on areas to consider for buying a house. I'll have a budget up to around £250k, ideally for three bedrooms. I'm used to living in big, cosmopolitan cities, so I'd prefer not to be anywhere too suburban. I don't have DC so schools aren't a concern at the moment. Where would you recommend?

Stoneygate and Knighton are really nice but would get you a nice 2 bed terrace for about £250k

Thanks @sophoa. I've seen a few places in those areas that look nice. As you say, I think 2 bedrooms is more realistic than 3 for my budget round there. Do you know what the West End is like? I've seen that area recommended online as well, but it's difficult to tell what places are like without having lived in Leicester.

If you're used to big, cosmopolitan cities, I'd seriously rethink Leicester, OP, unless there really are no other jobs. I did my best to like it, when work compelled a move there, and worked very hard to find things to like about it for eight years, but from my POV, it was a dead loss.

I'd choose Stoneygate or Knighton over the West End to live in, but it depends on what you're going for.

That's really useful to know. I'm not committed to Leicester yet and could probably find similar work elsewhere, so I could still change plan. I haven't found anywhere in the UK that I particularly like living except London, but buying a house and settling down in London feels prohibitively expensive, so I'm looking elsewhere. The Midlands is convenient for seeing family in the North and London, and I tend to like living in very culturally diverse places, so Leicester also ticks that box. However, I have no idea what it would be like to live there.
What was it about Leicester that you disliked?

Honestly- go for Birmingham if you can be in the Midlands. I’ve recently finished training and living in Birmingham for the last 8 years but I also did a one year stint in Leicester. I lived in Leicester for a few months but then decided to just commute from Birmingham because I didn’t enjoy the life Leicester has to offer.

At least there has been A LOT of money pumped into Birmingham as part of the big city plan over the last 10 years. Birmingham also has lots of areas very different from each other. For 250k you might get a nice terrace in areas like Moseley maybe. I rate it now as a great city to live despite the reputation which I honestly think is snobbery and I say this as a Londoner (born and bred) who now is doing a stint in Sussex.

Most people who live in Leicester with professional jobs tend to commute to Nottingham, Birmingham or London (or to the big Leicestershire employers - eg next/joules/leics uni/leics hospitals). On that basis go for the areas with the best schools which are also relatively close to the stations you need. With a 250 budget a 2 bed terrace in Oadby would be brilliant because all the schools are outstanding and have been so for years. Knighton/Stoneygate aren’t great for schools unless you go with private.

Another option is to go north if you will be working within Leicestershire or commuting by car towards Nottingham. For £250k you could get a 3 bed terrace in a number of lovely villages.

www.zoopla.co.uk/for-sale/details/56556605?search_identifier=b0638b5351869947a8ad6f6c4a53071b

I do love the period property in Birmingham- such great value but market always moves fast

@Isthisanokname

That's really useful to know. I'm not committed to Leicester yet and could probably find similar work elsewhere, so I could still change plan. I haven't found anywhere in the UK that I particularly like living except London, but buying a house and settling down in London feels prohibitively expensive, so I'm looking elsewhere. The Midlands is convenient for seeing family in the North and London, and I tend to like living in very culturally diverse places, so Leicester also ticks that box. However, I have no idea what it would be like to live there. What was it about Leicester that you disliked?

A lot of people don’t like living in Leicester because they don’t like diversity and can’t afford to rent outside of Narborough Rd / other studenty areas. If you choose a good established area with outstanding schools it’s usually a nobrainer.

I disagree- I’m black and my friend is Asian (Indian) and we both decided to commute from Brum when posted there. I like diversity hence why I enjoyed Birmingham but there is just something about Leicester?!

I also moved there from London, OP, from a tiny central London flat when circumstances meant it was no longer practicable for us. We both worked in the city centre in Leicester.

Leicester is culturally diverse, it's true, in terms of there being lots of different ethnicities living broadly unproblematically side by side, but if by that you also imply cultural diversity in terms of lots of interesting stuff going on under the umbrella of 'culture', I found that not to be the case. On the up side, you could get wonderful Asian food, and things like Diwali and Holi were often fun, and there are some gorgeous Arts and Crafts houses, and an annual comedy festival.

On the other hand, there was only one main theatre which did only a couple of original productions annually, and seemed to mostly have touring musicals, a couple of small museums (and the Richard III visitor centre!), very little live music of any kind, no decent bookshops, and not much of a cultural scene in general -- and if you are relying on being able to nip back to London for gigs/theatre, the last fast trains back to Leicester leave St Pancras very early, and the later ones can take the best part of two hours rather than just over one. The city centre feels quite run down, and has been wrecked by bad development, dominated by the Highcross shopping centre, but with lots of empty shops, or spaces occupied by charity shops or pop-ups, on the actual streets.

I'm not from the UK originally, but have lived in several different parts of it, and I've lived in much smaller places with far more going on.

The other thing I found difficult (which may of course not bother you at all) was being so far from the coast -- it's a good two hours or more in the car, and rather more to get to nice beaches, and there was something kind of mad and desperate about the way people flocked to Rutland Water in hot weather. East Leicestershire has some pleasant, rolling countryside.

I would agree with @CarHire101's suggestion of Birmingham as far preferable, if you need to be in the Midlands.

And 'disliking diversity' was certainly not a problem for me, @GrumpyHoonMain. And I desperately tried to like Leicester. We bought and renovated a lovely house, we got involved in whatever there was to get involved in, made good friends, and we tried to make it work for almost eight years, our child was born there -- with hindsight we flogged a dead horse for too long. I can honestly say that my heart lifted any time we travelled out of Leicester and sank when we returned.

It was just a place that really didn't work for us.

I’d go for Birmingham over Leicester

I never understand ‘diverse’ and ‘culture’ as being a strong pulling force to move to a city.

Just because you have people of different skin colour living amongst each other, doesn’t mean your life is culturally diverse. Eating Asian food, seeing mosques, being surrounded by ‘culture’ but actually not being that culture, all seems a bit pointless imo. I can understand living in a city for variety of food, but to me Leicester is very much an Asian city.

Leicester is a dump. The culture of Leicester is one where it’s a bunch of migrants who moved to the city for jobs in clothing manufacturing. Then the Central Europeans moved to the city for jobs in factories (seem to be a lot of food manufacturing).

Child poverty is a huge problem. English is a problem for school aged children as it’s their second language/they don’t know it. The education system receives less funding from the council than other areas. Health care is terrible - I’ve been refused everything and moved counties to be told I was eligible.

The city isn’t rich. You will get bored very quickly. It’s small. Looks awful. Market is grim.

So why are you wanting to buy?

Let’s not forget Leicester has sweat shops where workers are earning below min wage. They can be illegal and living in poverty.

At school my friend (I went to a school with 10% of the year where white) and a friend went to Pakistan when she was 17. All her friends told her she was getting married, she was told it was for a holiday. She came back married. It was normal and none of her teachers said anything. She was forced to stop education.

The men who used to hang around the taxi rank near the Sainsbury’s were the same men who would touch me up in clubs when I walked past.

The Highcross was extended which looks fab, but I feel a lot of out of town go there to shop and ignore the rest of the city.

What culture will you be part of?

It’s only an opinion - but Birmingham is better for travelling to and from, as well as in and around.

I'm from a large town on the outskirts of London originally and I moved to Leicestershire 10 years ago. The city centre is like most town/city centres. I wouldn't want to live in a big town/city centre again but Leicestershire has some gorgeous places to live and there is always loads going on (pre covid). We did live in Market Harborough for a while. A small market town, beautiful and with great transport links but it is expensive. We are now north Leicestershire which I prefer. It's cheaper and still great transport links. We are only a 20 minute drive from the city centre.

I lived in a village in east Leicestershire for years, and worked in the city, and while the countryside was very pretty and my village prosperous, safe and chocolate box-y, I found it insular, conservative in all senses of the word, and the city never failed to depress me, despite my best efforts. I think it's more run down than many city centres, and I was always aware of the run-down Victorian factories still operating as sweatshops (highlighted by the Boohoo scandal during Coronavirus), and the HMOs in poor areas which house the people who work in them for under minimum wage. Of course there is also wealth in the city, but there's significant poverty, and I felt that there was also a notable amount of 'white flight' (and to a growing extent, middle-class Asian flight) out of the city to the villages, meaning that, aside from some prosperous suburbs, the people living in the city were largely poor. Child poverty I know was way above national average.

I have lived in Leicestershire for the last 20 years, and I would agree with everything @TheRonettes said.

Leicestershire is lovely. The county is a great place to live with beautiful countryside and lovely, affluent villages, but yes, it is conservative in all senses of the word. I am fortunate to be able to live in one of those villages, a few miles south of Loughborough. The biggest downside of living here in the centre of England is that we are as far from the coast as it’s possible to be in these islands. A daytrip to the seaside will involve at least five hours driving.

Leicester is ok for shopping, restaurants, sport etc (although Nottingham is bigger & better) but I would not want to live in the city. There are a couple of nice areas, but the city centre and much of the surrounding areas are grim and in long-term decline. Most people who can afford to choose to live in the county. I have noticed increasing numbers of middle class Asian families moving out into my village and the surrounding villages, and I can completely understand why.

I’d be rethinking Leicester to be honest - ‘cosmopolitan’ it is not. Underwhelming and depressing would be more accurate.

Oh, also hello to all my neighbours! (N. Leicestershire)

Thanks everyone. It's really interesting to hear your experiences of Leicester, as I've not managed to find much elsewhere. Birmingham may also be an option so I'll keep that in mind as well.

I'd look at Nottingham, same good connections and despite being in the middle of redevelopments in the city, there's a lot going on.

I would avoid living anywhere in the city centre. I’d probably look at Oadby or Birstall as both are a short drive to the city centre but decent areas. There are lots of nice villages in Leicestershire if you don’t mind village life.
Nottingham would be better though.

I was going to say Nottingham too. A lot nicer and a lot more going on. Just be careful about areas of Nottingham, some are very rough and scary and some are utterly beautiful.

For £250K you will be fine in Nottingham, firmly in the middle of the "beautiful" and "scary" extremes. There's a 3 bedroom house at the end of my road for £245k.