Moving further out

[Bishboshboom]

I couldn't think of a better thread title.

If you moved a lot further away for a cheaper property, did you end up moving back?

No. I moved 161 miles north, then another 100 and am about to go another 85 miles even further north.

I guess house prices had to play a part in our decisions but I prefer being away from London and I like the lack of London pressure a lot better, and the countryside here.

Ooh I like the gradual moving. Was this closer to family? Has it affected earnings? Have you made a new life?

I'm in the SE and can't afford a size/type of home I want. Can't pay off/own current home and save for retirement. Saving for retirement I.e. investing is a better return, so living in a more affordable home makes sense. Paying portion of rent in shared ownership which makes no sense

But I grew up in the SE, friends are here. Quite hard to break the emotional connection.

I've wrestled with this all my life but now realise decisions need to be emotional and financial.

I moved up north from london and hated it, but then again, I did go to Manchester (land of constant bloody rain!) I should have gone further north - Scotland for instance.

I missed London and the south plus my friends, and if I were back in England I would definitely live down south - probably somewhere around Brighton.

I moved from London to Scotland and then came back to London after four years. I made a fairly drastic move, though, to a very rural village miles from the nearest anything, and ultimately found it very insular. I thought a big amazing house would compensate for the loss of city and having all my friends nearby, but it really didn’t.

Ultimately I suppose it totally depends on what you’re looking for out of life. DH and I are childfree and neither of us live near our families, so our friends, social lives, loads of stuff to do, and easy access to mainland Europe for holidays and visiting friends there is really important to us. We live in a small house in Zone 3 which needed a lot of work when we bought it, and accepted that as the compromise.

Do you find it relatively easy to make friends and join in with a community? If you do then leaving your existing friendships behind needn’t be so much of a wrench - especially if you go somewhere on a decent train line and can can still maintain decent contact. There are parts of the Kent, Essex and Sussex coast which are still relatively affordable and up and coming, so less compromising.

Only briefly.

As a FTB I had to move to another town where I could just about afford to buy a (horrible doer-upper) house in a horrible area.
A few years later I moved across the country but this time it was for work related reasons and moving back to my home area was not practicable even if it was now affordable.
Moved one final time where money was no object and oddly enough bought in the same area that I moved to as a FTB.

Did consider moving back to my original area and indeed the chance did come up when my parents died.
We moved into their house (my old family home) for a while but it was very different with no family nearby and the village had changed so we sold.

Ooh I like the gradual moving.

Was this closer to family?

No, it was to get out of the South East. I'd lived there all my life and he'd been in London for six years. He only moved there for job prospects and I was there because I was raised there. But I never really 'felt' it with the SE.

Slightly closer to his family, from whom we quickly became estranged.

Further away from my family, who we are also estranged from as well. We basically had no ties.

Has it affected earnings?

Yes - upwards. He continues to WFH and after we left London got a new, remote job with about a 20% pay rise.

Interestingly he was looking at the same job in Edinburgh yesterday, it's about 5k less, but offers 30% bonuses, which is 21% more than his firm offer, who are primarily London based. So, the earning potential for Edinburgh (which we wouldn't actually move to, we'd be accessible by train) are looking far more rosy than we thought, should he want to leave his Manchester based job.

It went: remote London job WFH during covid, move to Midlands, his job came with him, then got a new remote London based WFH job, re-assigned to Manchester office when we moved to the NE; now we're looking further up in the NW he'll probably ask to be re-assigned to London again due to a better connection, but maybe he'll look for a new Edinburgh based job instead.

He's only been into the office 4 times since Covid (tech industry/he is in short supply).

Have you made a new life?

Not in the slightest. Not found anywhere we would want to settle - until our forthcoming move, where everything just feels 'right' and the people feel super friendly.

So, it's not been all plain sailing, but it definitely feels like the right direction to be going in. I miss the V&A and a few mates but other than that, I don't miss the SE in the slightest.

The weather seems to be grim no matter where you are these days, so I'm not sure that should really be a barrier for folks anymore.

Have you made a new life?

I forgot to say, that's primarily because all three rentals we have had have been desperately unsuited to us, and we knew within 3 months of moving into each one of them that we just couldn't stay in those homes, so we made zero effort to integrate or make friends.

I will say, you can't just pull a rabbit out of a hat and find the perfect area for you straight off the bat - at least not when you're doing hundreds of miles of round trips looking at properties. That's been the hardest part; finding a forever place. Our next move will be to our fourth and final county, we feel the town is absolutely smashing. But, it's taken a lot of legwork to get to this point.

We've moved several times over the decades but only once was it to move further out - and that was our latest move.

I don't know if you would call it a "lot" further away but we moved about 40 miles north of where we used to live. There is now an hour's commute to get to the office when not working from home.

But the difference in house prices is enormous! Where we used to live an average 4 bed home is around £750k. Where we have moved to, 40 miles away, the average 4 bed home is around £325k.

We bought an old 4 bed farmhouse with almost 3 acres of land on the edge of a small village just outside of a town with 27,000 people for quite a lot less than a bog standard 4 bed house on an estate or a 4 bed Edwardian semi where we used to live.

The house needs work doing but that was reflected in the price. We are both very keen on gardening and we've always wanted a sizeable garden. So this was the perfect choice for us. Also DH has some hobbies where having a larger outdoor space helps.

We're two miles away from a small town with Morrisons, Tesco, Lidl and Aldi and everything else you might want. We're also 40 miles closer to family.

All in all, this has worked for us because we were looking for a very specific property and we knew that we'd never afford it where we were then living. This gives us a project to work on.

I doubt we'll move from this house (we're in our late 50s) - I only see leaving here if either of us end up in a nursing home.

Would we have moved just for the sake of getting a cheaper house? Probably not, we were looking for something very specific that we could only afford by moving further away.

That's exactly where I can't afford to live. Lots of friends there. I have lived in lots of places and I do think Brighton is as good as any plus I have the connections there.

Those are exactly the things I'm looking for. I don't need to be in the middle but I like the village feeling in parts of London, Greenwich for example. A place where people go out and do stuff.

I'm not sure. I've been extremely focused on my career for over a decade and have 'forgotten' how to make friends so it will take time and effort. That's why I don't want to make a mistake and have to move again. I realised I was holding onto hope I'd meet someone and split costs and start a family. Starting a family is unlikely now at 44 but a healthy happy life around people is what I want. I like to contribute to a community so sense of community is important. Sorry that was a waffle.

I'm sorry for your loss.

That all sounds like quite an adventure. I actually don't mind the thought of moving a lot with someone. I just wouldn't want to do it on my own too much as I find admin really draining!

Yes I feel I need to do a lot of research. Problem is that could be endless. How many towns and places fit the bill etc.

But maybe I need to have a weekend looking (in the car) and visiting places in the south east from a would I like to live here perspective. And the same for a couple of other regions. If nothing else I will get more clarity.

That sounds like a lovely house.

We wasted an awful lot of time trying to analyse from afar. By far the best experience is always on foot. Stay over a Friday night and see what a town is like at work close time, pub kicking out time, Saturday when everyone is shopping. Drive round all the streets and you will quickly get a good feel for the good areas - you would be amazed. One area we were borderline on and drove around at 5pm on a Saturday and on those two roads, saw two community support officers and a pair of scrotes on motorbikes wearing balaclavas, all in the space of five minutes.

We ruled out the town we are now moving to for two years before by not doing this, and focused on one I absolutely don’t want to live in now by not doing enough of it soon enough.

Very good advice thank you. Good idea about a Friday and Saturday.

I moved to Manchester from London not long after graduating. I still wanted to live in a city but couldn't ever afford to buy anything in any down South. I stayed in Manchester for a few years then my husband and I moved about half an hour away to live in the countryside.

I've never regretted leaving London, I think in terms of city living I prefer Manchester both for financial and quality of life reasons. And I've never regretted leaving Manchester either, but that's because we moved to a cheaper semi-rural location rather than trying to stay in the city itself. If we'd insisted on staying in Manchester, the suburbs we'd have been able to afford would have been ones we'd be unhappy to live in.

No. Moved from South London (Carshalton) to a small market town in Wilts and never went back. Never regretted it - particularly after having seen what they have done to the centre of Sutton!

The price our original small terraced house is going for on Zoopla means we couldn't if we wanted to!