5 years ago we moved away from family to relocate for my partners work. We moved to a very desirable location & it has so much for us in the sense of things to do & local supermarkets being close by. At the time we would travel the 4hrs back & forth to see family when required as we didn't have any ties stopping us from doing so.
Fast forward several years & we now have children & starting to notice how much easier it would be to be living closer to family. Just being able to see them when we like & our children not having to 'get to know them' as such each time they come for the day. We have now gotten to a point where we need to move to a bigger house & struggling to know what to do for the best. We are looking in our current area & whilst we would like to continue living here, realistically we cannot afford everything we'd like & there are lots of areas we would like to avoid! My partner is getting fed up with the increase in crime & how tourists take over the place every weekend. We are fortunate that our children are not yet school age & my partners work can be done from anywhere so we aren't restricted in that sense. I enjoy my work & its very convenient for our family circumstances at the moment but ultimately is just a usual office job.
We are now wondering whether to move back to be closer to family so our children can actually see other people & get to know their cousins etc! We haven't made any friends in the local area even though we've been here so long which means that our children don't always get interaction with others outside of nursery. It also means seeing their family every 3 months or so as travelling back & forth isn't so easy, nor finding room to stay when we do go back.
Id like to be closer to family, we would get much more house for our money too but it would mean me 'starting again' as such with my job etc & perhaps moving to an area I don't like as much as the one I live in now.
If we stay where we are we are still in the same situation with hardly seeing family & we would have to live in a property that doesn't suit all our needs but we'd like the area more & I would have a job & my children wouldn't have to change nurseries.
Has anyone been in the same situation? Did anyone move back to be near family which was the best decision? Or has anyone stayed living away & have any reassurance for us!