Where to live near Oxford?

[Ruthietuthie]

We are considering moving for a dream job in Oxford (currently in the US, but from the UK) but the salary (university position) is far less than we make now.
Where would be a lovely place to live, commutable to Oxford (although probably not going in everyday)? 500,000GBP budget, three bedrooms ideally, period charm if possible, good primary and secondary school. A friendly small town or village would be ideal, as I imagine we can't afford Oxford itself.
Thank you.

Thank you @girljulian. I wouldn't have expected that. Is it also hellish to go on the train or the bus? I know driving in and parking would be a real pain.

It really depends on where in the US you're coming from. I'd start with schools and commute. The state of U.K. state schools is fairly dire and funded at a much lower rates than the US.

@Sloop89, that's a good point. Where we live in the US has very underfunded public schools and our son goes to a private school. That won't be possible if we are on one salary in the UK. I haven't lived in the UK for twenty years and wonder if many of my presumptions - for example, that it will be easy to find a good state school - are now out of date? They probably are.

Getting into a good state school for an in-year place will be a complete nightmare....and even the good ones will come no where near a US private school. I think you would be best touring some of the state schools here and seeing what you think first. It will be a massive step down for your son and you'll need to be comfortable with it. Will you be ok with no or very poor sporting facilities? 30 in a class? You'd be best off renting first, getting your school place and then buying as you'll be able to choose from a wider area.

@Sloop89, this is all news to me, so I am glad that you pointed it out. And good idea to rent first.
Our son's school is incredible - one of the best in the country, with wonderful teachers, music, art, sport, specialist librarians, and of course small classes and really high standards - and we love our house and neighborhood. My career is well-paid here, but depressingly stagnant, and I had always admired this Oxford department and program and particularly the context in which I would be working (one of the incredible museums). It is just so exciting intellectually.
But it means my husband giving up his career (which he would do - he wants me to be able to shine, and he's always been a "work to live" person whereas I am the opposite) and, perhaps, a significant cost to my son, which I am not ok with.
Going down to one salary, and a UK academic salary at that, would mean that we were on less than a 1/4 of what we earn currently. Written out like that it sounds like madness, I realize.
Lots to think about.

I've spent a lot of my life in Oxford and it's not all its cracked up to be. House prices are very expensive and you'll likely end up in a dump compared to where you are now in the States.

I would think very carefully about moving your family if the only motivation is "dream job".

Dream job may not turn out to be so dream after all. You may find out that the internal politics are dire. I have moved in academic jobs before. In one place I was lauded as a key expert and valued contributor, the other I struggled to make an impact and was generally not well thought of, and the politics in the place were very toxic (got out of there within a year).

You're uprooting your entire family, changing your childs education, having your husband find a new job, going for 1/4 of your wages and probably going to end up in a much smaller and poorer house in a worse neighborhood. I would want to be pretty much 100% sure that this new job was going to result in a big payoff for you (rewarding in terms of your entire families lifestyle, not just money) in order to risk that move.

I have spent a lot of time in the States and worked there for months at a time. My general experience of it is that it isn't a great place to live if you have no money. If you are in a solid middle class job though, the lifestyle you will have is generally much better than it is in the UK. In my opinion anyway.

How old is your child? Many if the villages have their own primary schools, but the secondary situation is definitely more patchy. Also worth thinking about looking out along the main rail routes - potentially further away from Oxford itself - rather than closer on the road network, as it may be quicker to travel further by train.

Oxford is notoriously awful for driving so for me high priority would be a train link or close enough to cycle

I don't know if you have seen this one.

www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/131302616

Charlbury
station walkable - check trains to ocxford

get a 4 bed 2 bath for £510k

Kingham / Charlbury / Hanborough are on the train line in from Worcester, for example.

Oxford is notoriously awful for driving so for me high priority would be a train link or close enough to cycle

this, this, this,

Abingdon is lovely and an easy commute either by car to the park and ride at Redbridge (particularly through Kennington) or by train from Radley. It's doesn't normally take an hour!

If you're young and healthy enough an e-bike can be a game changer.

If you've got a kid I'd say follow the schools. I have friends in Abingdon and Kennington with kids doing well at Matthew Arnold and John Mason. So Vale Of White Horse. For an international slant there's the European School south of Abingdon near Culham.

Abingdon doesn't have a train station itself but Radley is close enough to the northern bits - folding bike and that's one way to avoid the daily mess that's traffic in Oxfordshire.

St Greg's in Oxford has such a rep it was renamed so avoid that!

Thame is nice and I vaguely hear good things of the school (Lord Williams).

Didcot isn't glam but a lot of quaint villages around, MUCH better facilities than it used to have, obvs great train links, and again, colleagues' kids did well at Didcot Girls / Birinus.

"Dream job in academia" - you do you but imo there is no such thing, they are all mad and annoying ;)

If you’re looking around Steventon / East Hanney / Abingdon, then bear in mind that plans for a large reservoir have been rumbling on for decades.

https://news.oxfordshire.gov.uk/proposal-for-giant-reservoir-faces-continued-opposition/

I agree with @GasPanic British academia can be very toxic, especially ivory tower institutions. You would be taking a massive drop in quality of life, not only for you, but also for your family, and you may end up miserable in your new job. It would be better to look at doing a sabbatical to Oxford rather than a permanent move.

This was on the bus!

Commuting into Oxford by road can be a nightmare. I would strongly advise looking at places that have a train link. That still leaves plenty of options, including Haddenham and Islip as previously mentioned.

@GasPanic and @Gloschick, thank you for the advice on UK academia. On the job front alone, I have friends at other UK institutions whose lives are so much more pressured than mine - tremendous pressure to get grants, publish, produce policy related/outreach materials too. I do all those things, of course, but the pressure isn't there in the same way. I think I have romanticized this job, when I need to remember that it is a UK academic job at a very difficult time.
You were right too that, if you are relatively well-off in the US (which we are, with two well-paying jobs and living somewhere with reasonably priced housing), the quality of life is higher than would be possible for us in the UK (not so for people who are poor). Where we live is also somewhere with strong progressive politics, so it isn't your Trump-loving, gun-toting, abortion-banning nightmare state. But the thought of being able to go home - still, after 20 years, the US doesn't really feel like home to me (although it definitely does to my son)...
Maybe a sabbatical to Oxford would be a better idea? And wait it out here until a better US job comes along. (My job has many perks - well-paid, low pressure, tremendous amount of freedom - but, because of the focus of my institution, there isn't opportunity to grow here. I don't have graduate students, for example, and can't build a research group).
At times like this, I wish I had significant independent wealth...

@Paperbagsaremine, thank you for all this advice. Your comments about all academic jobs being actually mad and annoying made me laugh. You are right, I know!

If you have secondary aged kids either choose Oxford itself or the nicer bits of didcot. I grew up in the area and the villages have an appalling bus service. You will spend your entire life as an unpaid taxi service and have no personal freedom

It sounds to me like a sabbatical would be a really sensible ‘test it out’ option before wholeheartedly committing to such a different life for the whole family. If you love it, you can look for a longer term option, but if you don’t, you have lost very little.

Congratulations! What a fantastic achievement to have been offered this.

I know several Oxford academics who are very happy with their quality of life. Of course there are pros and cons to anything but if you have a permanent position, it's a lovely lifestyle and there are plenty of perks to Oxford academic life.

I think quality of life has many components and of course it's subjective. I also have a lot of American family and have lived there too. Everyone will have their own opinion but what I will say is that my DH and I have chosen the UK because we think think we have a better quality of life here and I know a lot of Americans who have moved here. So I don't think it's an open and shut "quality of life is better in the US" thing at all. The school system is very different as well and it's not easy to make direct comparisons

On location, I would look at places on the train as your DH may end up with a job in London and that would make the commute easier for him

If you hate it, you can always apply for other jobs and with this on your CV, you will be able to shoot higher. I don't think you should do it as a secondment. This is your dream job, grasp it with both hands!