Should we relocate or do I need to get a grip?

[Armchairsocialist]

Ok, I was looking for a bit of insight/perspective on this so any thoughts or ideas welcome.

For a while now I've been wondering if we should move to a cheaper part of the UK and have more and nicer house for our money. Our son is three and we just applied for school in September where he's likely to get loads of support. He has selective mutism and is getting help with local authority for this.
So far so good, right? Trouble is our house is way too small and full of unfixable flaws. We've tried since June to sell/find somewhere nicer but no luck. Area is totally oversubscribed. Just saw on Rightmove stunning places near the hick town where I grew up for a fraction of the price.

Should we wait? Seems sensible given property crisis ATM but for how long? I know there are worse problems to have but the thought of my son growing up in this place makes me feel awful. He deserves a nice bedroom and space to play.

What's your current location like and what's the potential location like? We need more info.

Btw just realised I didn't mention my son very much. I really want him to get help and support with his SM but does it have to mean we live in a hellhole?

Don't underestimate the value of support for your DC. Will that be possible near 'hick town'

What are the unsolvable flaws? Can MN help think.of solutions?

Your house will sell at the right price. If knocking 20% off sells it, and allows you to buy what you want, is it worth it?
FWIW, that's what we've just done.

Thanks everyone, it's good to hear from you all. House is v small and can't extend further due to planning regs which is fair enough. We're on our own with no family or support network so any kind of help we can get shouldn't be underestimated, that's a v good point. Think we'll wait till he's settled at school then start ball rolling-again...

Just to give the heads up as a Mum with a DD with selective mutism, not all areas have services for this. There is no pathway in my locality which means ive had to pay for a private SALT.

Do you have one child? Because if so how small is small a house?

So I’m guessing you’re in the south east? Does it have to be there or the hick town? There are cheaper places in the midlands and north that would also provide the support you need for your son.

What's a hick town ? If you mean what I think you you do, sadly many of the more affordable places up here are starved of funding with poor public services precisely because there's a lot of demand.

DH and I have raised our family in the SE. He is born and bred in Northumberland and my in laws are supportive and nice people.

After 20 years, we have sold up and buying a three bed terrace outright five mins from the in laws.

We stayed for my middle son's special school but that went appallingly wrong three months ago. DH is loosing his job and I am NC with most of my birth family.

I wish we'd done it years ago.

We moved to a deprived area with lower house prices to get more space for dcs who have ASD and ADHD. Best thing we ever did. Having a lot of personal space is so important for them. We are lucky though that we found a supportive school, albeit even a supportive school is so teacher dependent. Last year, ds wouldn't settle in the new school, make no progress and we were seriously worried. This year, he has a new teacher and is flourishing. There are never any guarantees, but if a move gives you more space and takes some financial pressure of you, plus family support, I would do it sooner rather than later, to give your ds time to settle while still very young. The are we live in now is statistically very deprived and our life expectancy on paper has gone down by 12 years. I still find it much more pleasant and saver here than in the prosperous homecounty town we lived in previously.

Would your family in hick town actually provide support as plenty of families don’t? Do you actually like “hick town” given you call it that? I wouldn’t move somewhere I disliked for the sake of a bigger house.

Nice area, local things to do and friends are more important than a bigger house IMO. It’s easy to browse rightmove and think wow look what we could get in X place, but you have to really think about what your day to day life would look like - jobs, facilities, transport, people etc etc.

I would investigate the type of support, both specialists and schools my DC could get in the area you are seeking to move to, before taking the plunge.

My DC has additional needs, and the area we live in has first class support for DC with their needs, including lots of different specialist schools. The previous area we lived in was quite far from the heart of the county, so we'd have had to travel miles and hours to reach the specialist services.

But then you have to live in the hick town... Location location location !

What stands out in your post to me is that your son will get support for his needs from his future school in September. Surely that is a priority.

Don't move to a "hick town" that you will spend the rest of your life running down. It annoys every resident who is quite happy and content living in said town when people moving into the area to buy a bigger house when you moan about it not having x or y, that it's not London.

It's worth checking the cheaper properties in 'hick town' are actually worth it. We moved 200 miles last year for work and initial looks at Rightmove suggested that we'd be able to afford an amazing huge house with parking and space and garden etc etc. Once we got to know the area we realised those houses are also more difficult to get to for a no -driver, more limited access to schools and were basically a no-go!