Would you move to a nicer area?

[Imsorryyoufeelthatway]

We currently live in a great house in a not great suburb of a small city. The house itself is large, detached, ticks loads of boxes & is well situated for transport links, school etc. However the reason we could afford it is because it’s on the edge of a council estate. Now I have nothing against council estates - I spent my entire childhood in a council flat & most of my family still live in social housing - BUT in our area there’s a fair bit of anti-social behaviour, visible drug dealing (although that seems to go on everywhere) etc. and nowhere really to go out (although the city is only a bus ride away). We have great neighbours & obviously once we close our front door whatever’s going on outside doesn’t affect us.

We’re in a better financial position than when we bought the house 5 years ago & could afford a mortgage on a house in the lovely, village-y suburb 2 miles down the road with cafes, beaches, lovely high st. etc. but prices there are more than double for a similar size house, so we’d effectively be doubling & adding years onto our mortgage (if we stay put we could pay the mortgage off by the time we’re 50). It would also mean a lifestyle change. As it stands we have a decent disposal income for holidays, days out etc., which is important to us (we both grew up in poverty & want our DC to have the things we didn’t), but if we increased the mortgage we’d need to tighten our belts & accept that we wouldn’t be mortgage free until we’re in our 60s.

What would you do? Move to a nicer area & tighten belts or stay put & enjoy the disposable income?

The area is really important to us. We've lived in loads of places including a very rough drug ridden urban area, a rural village without transport, and a safe and friendly suburb of a large city.

Without a doubt, we prefer the last one and will stay here now. Our property is half the size of the one we had in the village or the one in the bad area, but being near to the shops and transport is life changing in a good way and it's so lovely to feel safe and meet friendly people with no obvious drug use in sight etc.

Another thing we noticed is that nicer areas have sweeter dogs while the rougher areas have the more bitey aggressive ones. I was bitten by a dog as a child so for me this is also a factor.

I’d move in your situation - not needing to worry about schools and brazen drug dealing. For sure.

The nicer area is likely to be a better financial investment in the longer term as it’s all about aspiration and supply and demand.

I live in a very nice area. I could have a huge property elsewhere but I value the quality of where I live. Over the decades when markets have ebbed and flowed out area has stayed solid. Houses rarely come up as people stay for a long time - and then they are often sold privately. We often get notes from people through our door - and local estate agents tell me they have waiting lists.

And then you woke up…

Sorry, just came to this thread via Google and couldn’t believe how ridiculous the last post sounded 🤣

We are doing excactly that . We are mostly doing it for our dc unfortunately their peers will be their main influence in a fee years moving to a better area will hopefully mean they wont get that much influenced by bad behaviour. Of course is not guaranteed but the chances are less