Has anyone sold up in London and moved somewhere very rural?

[smashinsoup]

Dh and I are mid 30s in London. We both work in high pressure corporate jobs. The prospect of rising to management is not attractive. We are both bored of the city and our jobs. We’ve travelled the world and have a good amount of equity in our flat.

We’re thinking about selling up and moving to rural northern Scotland. I’m from Edinburgh and used to visit relatives in this part of Scotland but have no family or friends there.

We’d pack in our very high paying jobs and take something either fully remote or potentially move into a new field. We could be mortgage free on a nice £500-600k house and have some savings.

Aware this is a very drastic change, but has anyone else jacked in the corporate rat race and moved somewhere remote?

How would you actually spend your time without getting in a car? I grew up semi-rurally and between me and my siblings and parents we were into gardening, horses, the natural world and farming. All of us ended up in towns for work. We also cycled to get places, but it wasn't overly safe.

We still have the same interests just urbanised i.e. gardening and animals. I know that for retirement I am likely to end up in an even more urban environment for the facilities.

However in my 30s I would definitely have moved and been fully rural if I could have made that work money wise.

OP I did not leave corporate ratrace but I do live in somewhere very rural in Scotland.

As you will surely be aware, culture/communities throughout Scotland are very, very different. What applies to the Borders (for eg) will not necessarily do so for the West Highlands, the Islands, Caithness/Sutherland (sorry for bunching those together), Orkney or Shetland etc etc etc. As others have said, do try before you buy. Rent and see.

Be aware (as I'm sure you are) that the prettiest areas are seen as 'their' playground by (a) the super-rich who buy vast estates and (b) camper-vanners who can range from the delightful and sensitive to the morons who park in passing places and empty their sewage containers either into the wild environment or into the - few and far-between - public loos, completely wrecking the local off-the-mains sewage systems. Be aware also that many communities in the blasted 'North Coast 500' route are heartily fed up of tourism and no longer the idyllic places they once were. If you're house-hunting, I'd avoid them like the plague.This is a very simple introduction:
https://thehighlandtimes.com/the-challenges-facing-the-nc500/

What will you do for work? Broadband has vastly improved in many areas over the past 10 years, but is still patchy. How far away will your customer base be? If your work will involve collection /deliveries, then bear in mind that postal and courier delivery/collections are much more expensive. The same applies for deliveries of building materials etc etc if you are planning a renovation project. Even petrol/diesel can cost an awful lot more. Ditto garden supplies. I can't - for example - get bulk compost delivered where I live. I have no mains gas. Wood-burning stoves for new properties have just been banned. I live in an idyllic spot surrounded/shaded by trees, but this means that solar panels and heat-pumps are not really a practical proposition. The short growing season (and thin poor soil) means that it's really difficult to grow lots of veg - although potatoes and kale do very well. Also peas and beans. My newly-shooting roses have just been eaten by deer, which are everywhere. You'll have a choice - garden inside a cage or polytunnel, or let nature take its course.

Getting to and fro - if your chosen place involves a ferry of any kind then be aware that these have been vastly problematic over the past few years and the problems have in no way been resolved. The roads are mostly single track and twisty - and so always slower than down south - and can be icy and ungritted in winter. Private tracks to house - we have one - always develop potholes and cost hundreds if not thousands to repair.

Facilities. Septic tanks not a problem in theory but can become waterlogged or overflow and need emptying and this costs hundreds of pound. In our previous home, our private water supply regularly froze; even here, with mains water, my neighbour's washing machine in an outbuilding was inoperable during the last cold spell.

Have just been to nearest supermarket - approx 2 hrs each way on the excellent local bus. One bus per day; lucky to have it. Check what's available where you want to settle. We are at the end of supermarket supply chain, which means that perishable items -fruit, veg - often have very short shelf lives. So - after a long trip, if you're wise, you buy what looks most likely to last for 5 or 6 days, rather than what you might originally have intended.

Communities. There will be some people whose families have been there for generations. They will have seen massive changes - of culture, opportunities, wealth. They may be land rich, or sadly outpriced by newcomers when it comes to housing. For heaven's sake, be sensitive. No, they mostly don't want to be holiday-home cleaners, and why the hell should they? There will be hand-knitted newcomers - some charming, some irritating. They will offer expensive sour-dough bread and/or tree-hugging sessions....

Education. Rather different from England. Our local primary school is fab, but some tinies face almost an hour's journey each way. Some secondary pupils have to board. Being a parent is however one of the best ways to integrate into the local community. So is being handy and willing, male or female. (That's the same as anywhere else, really...)

OP just two more things:

a) Health care - mentioned by previous posters. We have really excellent GP service but consultants are mostly 4 hours away - each way - in Inverness. A simple appointment can often mean an expensive one or two nights in an hotel. (I can't stand Inverness hotels so generally find somewhere along the several railway lines that connect with Inverness to stay, and then travel in.) In emergencies, an ambulance can take between half and hour to one hour to reach us. Dentists are not thick on the ground. For things like choice of optician/hearing aids etc, then another 3-4 mile journey each way.

b) I was looking at The Guardian website for recipes, and came across the following: https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2024/apr/16/wild-camping-and-hiking-in-knoydart-scotland-highlands It's the sort of thing you might find written about the remote place you choose to settle in. Only you can decide how you feel about it. For some it's inspiring; for others, it's good for business; for yet others it's a mixture of invasive plus irritating. And there will be other feelings/responses, as well: there's no right or wrong answer. I tend to feel happier about such stuff if the company concerned creates meaningful jobs/profits for local community members, however.

Have you ever lived anywhere very rural? I did as a teenager and it was pretty bleak. Personally I like a bit of civilisation but we are all different.

Electricity is around 6% higher than in the UK, they also pay more for petrol.

Eh? Scotland is in the UK. It makes up about a third of the UK.