Moving to Liverpool, commuting to London - is it mad?

[YouHaveAnArse]

We are living in London and renting - while we have a good LL who charges a decent rent, the news and the fact that estate agents are charging significantly more for flats in the same building is adding to the massive anxiety I get for six months a year about whether we will be made homeless. We have some family and health things going on at the moment which is further underlining how difficult it is to not be able to properly plan more than a year in advance as you don't know whether you'll have to move, or how difficult it is when you live five hours by train or a nightbus away from somewhere you now have to visit more often.

We can't afford to buy in London, unless it was shared ownership, which I'm not entirely sure is a good option. I don't care about the property ladder or building up equity, I just want to put down some money for a place that will be ours and not have to move again unless we really want to. We don't have or will have kids, we both have jobs which would allow us to move out of the city as long as we can attend our London offices in person once a week or fortnight - colleagues of mine are currently doing this and I've been asking how they've been finding it. And I've lived in London long enough that I would be more than happy getting to know a new city, especially if I feel I'm able to relax a little more on a day to day basis. We want to make a home there rather than the temporary feeling of renting which makes you feel like you can't really get yourself involved in the community and get to know it, even if part of me worries that we're just moving London's unaffordability problem to a different community?

DH is quite keen that any move would be to another city - neither of us drive, I want to live somewhere which has its own thing rather than being a dormitory community of London (plus buying/renting in the traditional commuter belt is not much cheaper, especially when factoring in train costs) both of us want the potential to change jobs rather than keep our current ones if we decide to do so which makes Manchester, Liverpool or Leeds/Sheffield seem like good places to start. I lived in Manchester for a while, but Liverpool looks like a good option - family were from there so I feel a bit of an affinity, it's cheaper to live there, it has a good feeling about it that makes me feel it could be a good place to settle. DH is happy with a similar size flat as the one we rent just now, I would be too, but the leasehold thing makes me wonder if it would effectivley feel like renting with the extra restrictions and potential hikes in cost. I don't have a problem with somewhere needing redecorating or having to plan to replace the kitchen over the next few years etc. but we don't have the skills to do anything major, we'd have to pay other people to do it for us.

I don't even know where to start looking other than 'where's near the station' or which areas are realistically an option to get to the train first thing. I think £100k would be a good realistic starting budget to look at in terms of a mortgage that's realistic for us to get and pay off quickly (we are 41 and 45) whilst also leaving us space to pay for other costs and room to weather any rate hikes and still live our lives, but it's hard to say until we start properly planning. There are lots of houses by Anfield that are well within that but I keep seeing people say it's a dodgy area - I never know what that means given that what people consider 'dodgy areas' near us in SE London are a) ones we're probably priced out of b) seem absolutely fine to me c) often seems code for 'working class' or 'too many chicken shops' - it's more that my experiences of Victorian terraces is that they're generally massively damp that puts me off!

This is a long-term thing to think about whilst we keep adding to our deposit funds, making ourselves look like good people for the bank to lend a load of money to, and dealing with other stuff, but any advice? Thanks and sorry for rambling, I'm just overthinking as usual :)

8mins by car. Via the tunnel with toll. Again need a good 20 - 30mins before train due to leave.
Or 35min walk* (by ferry - which doesn't start until after 7am).

And this is the problem that OP will hit constantly. The time just adds up.

Nearly £190 a month service charges though

@RedToothBrush making some great points and bringing a bit of reality to the discussion. Can’t believe some of the suggestions and they pretty much depend on a near perfect train service which up here is non existent.

I cannot emphasise enough how little I'm interested in property as an investment - I just want somewhere to live and ideally to never have to move again. If by 'up and coming' people mean 'the area is cheap/has a bad rep but is safe and there are increasing numbers of nice things there' then that's good.

As I said, I know people who are currently doing it so I've been speaking to them a lot about how they are finding the commute, the time, the cost etc. My friend in Crosby takes the train to Lime Street and then from there to King's X which is near where we work - it might be unrealistic budget-wise to manage to live within three miles' walk of the station but if possible that would be a big help too. But as you say, a lot to consider.

We are looking at a rise of £200-£400 on our rent, whether we stay here and the LL puts it up or we try and move (even smaller places than where we live now are expensive, and that's the listed price, not the price people eventually pay as they are now expected to put in bids over the asking price and/or offer a year's rent in advance which would take a good chunk of our deposit savings until we can replenish it.....and potentially have to do the same for the next place). If there is a chance of us being able to buy somewhere, and we spend the same every month including travel as we do now, or would with a rent rise, it doesn't seem like a mad decision.

I'm not discounting it, but DH feels that if we're going to move out of London, we should move Out Of London.

If you want to see a travelling version of Dantes inferno get the 1st super off peak train out of St Pancras (7.02 I believe) headed for Sheffield

This made me laugh, thanks @BritinDelco 😂I had a client in Sheffield so I used to get this very train most weeks - until he got fed up of paying my expenses (stereotypical Yorkshireman) and agreed I could work from the London office.

@YouHaveAnArse I really think you're underestimating how energy zapping a long train commute (and early start) is every week. I've done it a lot for client (I've had to commute from London to a variety of places including Sheffield, Leeds, Chester, Glasgow and Paris) It's manageable for 6-12 months but it gets tiresome very quickly. Especially given how unreliable the trains can be. And crowded. And then seat reservations get screwed up, or vandals do something on the line. You seem to be planning to do this for the rest of your working life?? I would be very wary of committing to this as you will end up with minimal/zero flexibility. And these is always the huge risk that your employer will want you in the office more frequently which you don't seem to be really tackling. It might seem fine now but things change - or do you think all those people who moved a long way from their offices and are now screwed were just foolish and not as smart as you?

I also think your budget is completely unrealistic for what you want. It's not the 1990s. Prices have risen significantly, especially in the NW. There is huge demand to live there (that's where I'm from originally and where my family still live) and it's actually quite bonkers.

OK, I'll answer a few questions in one go:

• we expect to have £50k saved as a deposit plus the cost of extra fees/moving etc by the time we're ready to do anything. Our household income at present is £80k, not including any bonuses or extra income here and there. There's no family help on the former and I'm working on the principle that the latter will not change in terms of working out what's feasible.
• it's not going to be for a year or so for various reasons, which will give chance to save.
• our offices are both easy walking distance from King's Cross.
• As others are already doing a cross-country commute, I'd be expected to work in the same way if we did it ie. starting between 9 and 10am, leaving between 5-5.30 depending on when I start. I have to be present by 10 so it's flexible but not too much. Colleagues have told me that on balance they are glad they've made the move although have not sugarcoated the downsides.
• We would both be open to changing jobs to something local after making the move and getting settled, should something arise - DH is in B2B PR, I'm in something media related (can't be more specific than that as there are about three places that do what I do and all of them are in London, it's one of those jobs that someone outside the area don't generally know exists! but the skills might be transferable to other roles or even other sectors entirely) - so living somewhere where there's a good chance of moving jobs if we choose and not being limited to just having to commute to London is good. We both like our jobs and would be happy keeping them given how things have worked out with others we know doing the same move/commute.
• Our current rent is £1050 a month, but after discussing with the LL yesterday regarding the renewal as we have some stuff going on at the moment that makes it even more important to be able to know what we're doing in advance, while we are able to stay in principle the rent will go up, and LL made the point that comparable flats in the area are £1450 - this may be even more by the time the renewal comes round. We are bracing ourselves for a £200-£400 increase. (For those who haven't rented for a while, especially in London, the costs of moving plus having to potentially offer a year's rent upfront and/or bid over the asking price to secure somewhere to live means that moving elsewhere within London or even anywhere smaller isn't going to save money, and I've got a year or so left on a waiting list for something medical and don't want to risk a move to a different area kicking me back to the beginning of the process). It's becoming increasingly, starkly unsustainable to live in this city as renters, we're in our forties now and I can't see things improving.
• The uncertainty of renting and the general housing crisis is massively affecting my mental health to the point that I have been off work with anxiety about it because the hopelessness of it all makes me feel quite desperate at times. I'm not under any illusions that buying somewhere is going to be magically stress-free, nor that this isn't an issue that also needs to be solved with therapy, but if there is a way to make things easier then I want to take that if we can. I'm saying this to give a bit of context when considering whether a longer commute would add stress to my life or not.
• If we could realistically stay in London, we probably would mostly because it's easier rather than enjoying living here specifically. I've been here for a long time and I'd be happy to move on just for something different as well as stability/affordability.

I don't think they're 'foolish and not as smart as you', ffs, there are people both of us work with who have been doing exactly this for years, and before Covid.

It might not be for the rest of our working lives. But the alternative is that our working lives don't actually end, because we're still paying private rent or in the best case scenario paying off a massive mortgage we managed to persuade someone to give us at 50. There really doesn't seem to be a good solution either way.

My budget is a starting idea based on 'put a postcode into Rightmove and see how much things within a three mile walk to the station might cost', it's not a fixed figure, I think I'm just nervous that banks just aren't lending money right now.

If your offices are near Kings Cross then Peterborough would be the best choice.

You could buy something for 400k in London, it won't be the fashionable parts but so what

also depends if you want a flag or house

flat

As someone who works in mortgages for a bank I can confirm that we are very much lending money right now. We are very busy and have huge backlogs. Right now the majority of the business is remortgages with a lot of it Buy to let but still doing purchases to 95%
You are being quite conservative in the amounts you are thinking of borrowing and won't get anything very nice for that
Why not look at what sort of mortgage you can get which is line with your current rent? Will open up so many more options and at the moment with renting you're looking at paying rent forever so even a mortgage term to retirement age is a better option

We were earning about the same amount and were able to get a mortgage of over 300k. We had a 5% deposit. We currently pay £1400 a month on our mortgage but I expect that will be much higher next year.

I know this sounds dramatic but I'm feeling really upset right now as I thought we had a get out of jail free card (OK, get out of jail via a long commute) and posters are adamant thaat it's not really a solution at all.

The issues with mortgages at the moment I think are also making me feel very conservative about what to borrow, because I want us to be able to weather the cost of rate rises which don't seem to be going away any time soon. I know a couple of people who bought in the past year and are screwed now because nobody saw the extent to which this would all hit.

That's where a long fix is a good option because then you know what you will pay.

I think it's better to pay more to stay in London as you will spend less money/time commuting.

80k income & 50k deposit gives you some options. What would you feel comfortable spending a month? 1.5k?

YouHaveAnArse you could look at Peterborough, Grantham, Doncaster or York - these are all the LNER route straight to Kings Cross . Grantham takes 1hr straight through , it's a bit a city but v easy to get to Notts or other parts of the country - cheap housing .

Yes but rates are high at the moment. May go higher but in my opinion won't go massively higher. So it's not like you are borrowing the max you can afford at 2% or anything like that
Borrowing just £100k on a joint income of £80k whilst paying over a grand a month in rent currently with a £400 month rise due is just a little too conservative in my opinion and is really restricting the areas you can look at
Play around with some calculators online
Nationwide has a good one it gives you an idea of how much you could borrow and how much it would cost
If you choose a five year fixed then your payments will stay the same
I don't work for Nationwide but my own mortgage is with them and they always offer competitive rates when you come to the end of your product term

I find the cost of trains staggering. Unless you can plan a month in advance and go at unsociable times, it was be eye-wateringly expensive.

If it's only once a month, I'd do it.

I'm sure you know this but it's not uncommon to pay monthly rents that far outstrip the equivalent mortgage payments (at least, until recently!) but banks still not believing you meet their affordability criteria...that's why I'm just never sure how conservative is too conservative.

I've just put our current rent into Rightmove, set the criteria to within three miles and it's just coming up with rooms in houseshares, so who knows what banks will make of that in terms of giving us money.

Being in my little Northern bubble I'm wondering would you be able to look at jobs up these ways and take a pay cut?
When I've been to London I was shocked by the prices of things, last time I went about 20 years ago now, it was about £2:50 for a can of coke, obviously the cost of everything is shite now, but lower living costs you could take into account?
I did adore London the times I went and I'd be reluctant to leave if it was my home town, but it's also great to know for under 300k you can buy a really lovely big house in a great area etc, London is wonderful, but eye-wateringly pricey to my tight northern self.

Oh, I'd totally look and take a pay cut (if I could still afford life with it!) but moving and changing jobs all in one go is a lot, starting with a move first seems sensible. It's good to think about overall quality of life rather than what you get paid, I reckon.