Where in London to buy for 900K for an international family of four?

[internationalfamily]

Hi everyone,

Sorry for yet another where to buy thread, but we could really use your help and insights.

We are planning to buy a house for our family of four. We have been exploring some areas and viewing houses over the past few months, but really struggling to make our mind up..

Here are the key factors...

Budget:

• Ideally somewhere between 750K-850K, but we can stretch to 900K.

Location:

• Needs to be relatively easily accessible to City (to both London Bridge & Strand)
• Excellent primary schools for our DD (who will start reception in 2023).
• Safe
• International community: both my DH and I are Europeans, we would like an open-minded and welcoming community
• Access to green space
• We currently live and like SW, but are (especially DH is) open to move other parts of London.

House:

• Three bedrooms
• Ideally a house with some outdoor space (one of the areas we disagree with DH who prioritise location over house and is fine with a flat too)

Our shortlisted areas are: Wimbledon Town (esp. Dundonald/Chase areas), Balham (Hyde Farm/Nightingale Triangle), Colliers Wood, East Dulwich.

Where would you buy from if you were in our shoes? Are we missing some other suitable areas? Looking forward to hearing your thoughts/suggestions...

@GreenestValley thing is if someone's explicit about that aspect, it makes it easier to suggest suitable areas. As you say there's nothing wrong with a preference. I personally prefer somewhere leafy and relatively affluent ( even when I'm not!!) and will prioritise it - I think partly it's because now im 60 I can't deal with scruffiness and grime as well as I used to and find anywhere really noisy or party student central a bit much these days.

Yes i agree and thats what im saying - can they just be explicit

I think she is being explicit.

Honestly, I don’t see so what is not open about wanting to have some expats like us… just to be crystal clear, I didn’t say/mean we want an area comprising exclusively of expats (nothing really wrong with that either).

Others have noted (perhaps rightfully) that everywhere in Z1-3 are cosmopolitan. I am simply clueless about some parts of London (including a large majority of SE ) hence the questions.

Britain doesn't really work that way though.

You will find a mixture of cultures and ethnicities in the majority of places.

You will come accross all sorts of people in the UK.

You talk like you are never going to move out of or explore one little area or travel anywhere else.

It's hard to explain

Basically you're saying: we're an expat professional family and we want to live in an area with lots of other expat professional families.

It just sounds very un-London-ish to me. I mean sure, ask for an area with green space and good schools and low crime and friendly neighbours -- that all sounds great. But why do you care where those friendly neighbours are from, or what kinds of jobs they have? Why isn't it enough that they're nice people from whatever walk of life?

Do you think you can only make friends with other expat professionals? The great thing about London is that's not true. If you move to somewhere with a good sense of community, you can make friends with all sorts of people.

So my advice is to look for an area that's a real community, where there's lots of things going on locally, rather than thinking in terms of what sorts of people live there.

There are certainly areas of London with more expats than others. Immigrants and expats are not the same thing. S.Ken has loads of French people for example. There are quite a few round me too.

I don’t even think it’s true that the majority of places in the U.K. has a mixture of cultures and ethnicities. That’s mainly true of cities.

Sorry but that is simply wrong. There are more or less cosmopolitan parts of the country/city.

So, what is your recommendation: Randomly pick an area and live there?

Such a strange comment…

Tell that to all the French in South Ken. Or British on the Costa or in the Dordogne.

Why are you telling the OP what she should be looking for. Surely that’s up to her?

It's not easy to articulate but I understand where the other posters are coming from. London is a cosmopolitan city and the ex-pat criteria is perhaps a little odd.

We live in Zone 7 and it's still very diverse. Just in case you think diversity stops at Zone 3...

Not a strange comment at all.

Not all expats live in cosmopolitan areas either, in fact many don't.

We have lived in a few lovely parts of London and around the country.

Your comments are strange tbh.

Others have noted (perhaps rightfully) that everywhere in Z1-3 are cosmopolitan.

Everywhere isn't though although there will be immigrants in most areas. Are you more concerned with being around professional people or diversity?

When I think of an expat enclave I think of Brits in Dubai or similar, I don't think it's like that in London which is a good thing imo.

Hi OP

I think the word ‘expat’ might be causing confusion here… expats are generally considered non-native residents who are living in said country for the purposes of fulfilling a (usually) short-term work contract.

Expat communities do exist in London, but they are actually quite small, and generally centred around the international school that the kids go to (Germans -> Richmond, Japanese -> Acton, Americans -> St Johns Wood, etc.)

If you’re choosing to live in the U.K. of your own free will, staying indefinitely, without a job tied to your time here, then you’re not really an expat. You’re just a Londoner :) Who happens to not be British :) Welcome!

I think what you mean is that you’re looking for an area that has a large’ish number of white collar professionals from a range of ethnicities.

That’s pretty much all of London!

That’s not to say that this sought after ‘group’ is evenly spread through all neighbourhoods. And I think that’s the tricky part. Walthamstow is a good example. If someone recommended Walthamstow you’d really need to know where exactly in Walthamstow you’d need to search. And this is true for almost all areas of London, apart from the super-expensive areas. You get little enclaves of slightly nicer housing butted right up against the more, shall we say, grittier streets of the area. The lines demarking safety, poor performing schools, and other social issues can be quite blurred, and you can only really avoid those issues by living outside of London.

Hope that helps! Good luck with your search!

This is exactly it.

The OP can't afford South Ken. And there's French people everywhere in London! (I'm married to one)

Not sure what the Dordogne has to do with it. My whole point is that London is not like other places.

Yes exactly, I agree

Something like 1/3 of the people living in London were born outside the UK. Some areas might have more than others but they're everywhere.

For what it's worth, there were load of French people in Islington where I used to live- and I have lots of French neighbours where I am now in Balham. (Plus Spanish, Australian, Belgian, Polish, Indian, Italian neighbours).

I think something in your wording has bothered some posters, I think it might be a bit of miscommunication or maybe you haven't expressed what you mean quite clearly enough.

I think I know what you mean about wanting to live somewhere with a vibrant international community...I may be reading into what you've written though! To be fair, everywhere I have friends and family in London seems to have young professional families from overseas, as well as families from different backgrounds and ethnicities.
I would say I find between the commons in Nightingale triangle a lot whiter than any other part of London I've lived in and thatmakes it feel quite un-London-ish to me. It's very international, lots of people from different countries, but very white.

Also, Balham is lovely but if I was you I'd rather be a bit further out and have a house or bigger flat at least. West Norwood is nice and has good transport and amenities- and is very quick on train to Balham and into central.

@Cyberworrier I find Balham very white in general.

Yes! We live in semi-rural Kent and have a diverse community here. Quite many expat families too, Brits who were stationed at Dubai, Singapore etc for some years as well as many from SA. Not to mention many EU citizens (including myself).

Dordogne and the Costa have significant expat (British) communities, like South Ken (French).

As I said before - immigrants and expats are not the same thing. There are areas of London which do have larger expat communities than others.

They are not the same thing, and in fact often congregate in oppositional areas (expats although not always, tend to be white, affluent professionals where immigrants tend to be not white, less professional social classes).

in her OP the poster is grouping the two as if they were much the same

international / having a lot of different nationalities / cosmopolitan (which suggests sharing of cultures so there is an educational aspect implicit in that)/ open minded / expat / professional / not brexity… fact is, the best place to look for a community like this is probably the whiter, richer areas of London.

no parts of zone 1-3 have Tory MPs that I can think of. If any do exist it must be literally one or two.

FYI none of this particularly offends me, I’m just pointing out the logic gap in the original question

Brexit vote by borough, many of the areas in yellow were 70+ % Remain so I don’t think you have much to fear wherever you go.

not that I think people who voted Leave are all anti European nationals coming to live here, by any means.

Expat vs immigrant is not a colour issue it’s a short term stay vs resident.

My NDNs are Indian expats, here for work, they will return to India eventually. Downstairs is Polish-British lady, born in Poland, now British resident.

Are you here to help the OP or just to argue with her search terms?

Agree, sounds like you’re not expats but immigrants. Just like a huge number of Londoners. So there’s no need to specifically look for an international community - it’s everywhere around you.

If you specifically want the rich, white version of international, then probably best to stick to SW London.