What is it like to move your children to a more rural location?

[Trafford99]

My husband and I have the opportunity to build our dream house. I never in my wildest dreams expected this. However the only thing that is putting me off is the location. I have lived in rural locations before but my children haven't. It is a little further in the sticks than we would have liked, surrounded by trees and a stream running through the bottom half of the garden (the plot is about 1 acre). 3 things worry me:
1- it may be dark, although we will cut a lot of the trees back there won't be a view as such.
2 - we have children, will the stream be a constant source of worry (even though we will fence it off)
3 - the children will miss having neighbours close by (although they will have a massive garden to play in!)
Does anyone have any experience of living somewhere like this or making a move like this? I feel we'd be stupid to pass this opportunity up but have to make sure it's right for the whole family (or am I overthinking it all 🤦‍♀️) .

I think you weigh up what life looks like in your current area vs rural. We moved from town where everything was seconds away to extremely rural. We liked the idea of having to facilitate them as teens rather than them having access to hanging around the town. Saying that it was handy for going for walks and runs which you can't do here and there's a lot of young guys in cars (not in this actual area but close) and I worry when they're older we'll have that to worry about. Love it here, fresh air, they can run madly about and we aren't too close to the neighbours, also lots of wildlife and we finally got pets. Pros and cons list

My biggest concern would be their social lives, especially as they get older. I had a friend who was reliant on her parents to take her everywhere as a teenager due to the lack of public transport where they lived and she really resented it and not being independent.

Why are you tied to this specific site, OP? Can't you buy land elsewhere to build on?

My tuppenceworth as someone who grew up very rurally was that there was a lot of teenage drink, drugs and sex, as well as appalling, preventable car accidents with young drivers. Drugs aren't less of a problem just because the dealer might be on a tractor.

Which is not to say you shouldn't do it, only that rural living isn't necessarily some safe teenage idyll.

The main thing is the driving. Don’t mind about anything else you mention.

Agree with most of what has been said before. We moved when our eldest was 5. So all the children have grown up with rural life. We are also near the coast. Thankfully they naturally got into sport/horses/surfing. Drugs/alcohol is a real problem with some young people because there is so little to do/lack of jobs/aspiration. I wouldn't move them if older than primary- it will be hard to adjust. However in all of this - it was me who found it the most difficult - don't underestimate how you might feel.

I lived rurally & as a result missed out on a lot of activities. My journey to school on the school bus was 45mins each way. My parents both worked so I couldn't do after-school clubs as there was no-one available to collect me.
Visiting school friends could never be spontaneous, it had to be pre-arranged & meant staying over at their place as my parents didn't want to pick me up. In fact my parents would not drive me anywhere - they were exhausted due to their long commutes caused by living in the middle of nowhere!
As a teenager, I walked a lot to get to nearby towns 4-5 miles away - I also hitchhiked a lot which would've horrified my parents if they had realised.
Ironically, my parents grew up in a small town so were able to do all the activities & sports their school offered however were happy to deny me such possibilities.
I went to university was in London - all my school friends living in equally remote areas also moved as soon as they could to cities!
I would never move that far from anywhere ever again.

My advice. Don’t do it. Rural living with teens, means you are responsible for getting them to pretty much everywhere ( unless you have decent public transport links).

I moved from urban to semi rural, 13 years ago. Huge garden, plenty of fun when the kids were young. Fast forward 5/6 years and myself and partner are taxi drivers to two teens all week. I hate it. Exacerbated by the fact that the town we live in, has very poor facilities.

On a plus ( I think) ) the nearest city is about 15 miles away and the kids can get a train ( ten minute drive away) independently.

No, thinking about it, rural isn’t all that is cut out to be.

@Jocasta2018

I lived rurally & as a result missed out on a lot of activities. My journey to school on the school bus was 45mins each way. My parents both worked so I couldn't do after-school clubs as there was no-one available to collect me. Visiting school friends could never be spontaneous, it had to be pre-arranged & meant staying over at their place as my parents didn't want to pick me up. In fact my parents would not drive me anywhere - they were exhausted due to their long commutes caused by living in the middle of nowhere! As a teenager, I walked a lot to get to nearby towns 4-5 miles away - I also hitchhiked a lot which would've horrified my parents if they had realised. Ironically, my parents grew up in a small town so were able to do all the activities & sports their school offered however were happy to deny me such possibilities. I went to university was in London - all my school friends living in equally remote areas also moved as soon as they could to cities! I would never move that far from anywhere ever again.

I don’t blame you for moving. . I don’t want to deny my kids any kind of social life, but really, driving 20 minute in the pitch dark to collect kids, is no fun in winter! Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

@riverrunner if you could lend me an extra £200-300K I'd have more choice! Land with planning is ridiculously expensive right now.

@MsTSwift

It’s not the stream that would worry me. It’s the lifts in cars with other teens when older. Dads car /country lanes /teen lads bravado is a fatal combination. Every year group at my school at least one person was killed that way. I wish I was exaggerating 🙁

Sadly, this is very true. However, whilst there are more accidents on rural roads than motorways, most aren't so serious.

I think if you worry about that, you'll never do anything and I wouldn't use it as a reason against moving.

We live rurally, absolutely love it but have never known anything else. All the older teens and adult children used to get taxi's back home after a night out. There is less to do if you consider things to do as organised events and buildings to visit. The countryside offers a different range of things to do. Many teens are into horses, some even into sheep-rearing. Some into shooting, fishing and so on. Mine aren't but many are. The young farmers groups are hugely popular where I live and very active - some groups are not just for farming people, more of a youth club. Many are involved in sports so football, rugby, tennis etc in nearby towns or larger village clubs. To have the open countryside as your play area as a young child is fabulous.

However, moving from a city would be a huge change. I would always recommend a large village in a rural area, or small town.

Thanks for all your comments. I think what I may not have stressed enough in the op is that I have lived in rural locations for most of my life. Its moving the children from a village to the sticks I'm thinking about. A lot of you talk about lack of amenities but honestly where we live now is still a 20 minute drive to the nearest supermarket and 45 to the city, so perhaps you would say we are rural at the moment 🤣
As for driving them around everywhere it wouldn't bother me. My parents did it for me. My husband and I used to do it for each other on nights out pre kids. I'd think nothing of an hour long trip at 2am to pick him up from the pub.
As for drink, drugs and underage sex, yep been there done that. It is true what a few of you have said about it being worse in rural areas I'm sure. But I do think it's something you have to tackle wherever you live nowadays.
The majority of our friends live in the sticks so no spontaneous meet ups anyway. Just worried the children Will miss the couple in the village that they call for whenever they are free. But with planning I'm sure we will still see them.
I think I'm swaying towards moving. We can always reevaluate when the children are teenagers and hopefully we will have made a bit of money on the house by then which will give us more options.

@riverrunner

Why are you tied to this specific site, OP? Can't you buy land elsewhere to build on?

My tuppenceworth as someone who grew up very rurally was that there was a lot of teenage drink, drugs and sex, as well as appalling, preventable car accidents with young drivers. Drugs aren't less of a problem just because the dealer might be on a tractor.

Which is not to say you shouldn't do it, only that rural living isn't necessarily some safe teenage idyll.

Oh yes, we still get drugs around. Although in totally rural places where there are a handful of houses and everyone knows everyone it is honesty less of a problem. I suppose zero street lighting and no street corners helps that!

There is of course the issue of county lines which is a real problem in the countryside especially areas with transport links to London.

@Rowl no not really. We've had break ins before on our barns and sheds. It's not nice but unfortunately becoming more and more common in the rural communities. The chances of someone breaking into your house are very slim.