We're becoming rapidly disillusioned with the London suburb we've lived in our whole lives. Not so long ago we thought we'd stay here our whole lives but in recent years it's gone downhill - overcrowded, awful traffic, rundown, rising crime, rude people etc. We're at the stage now that we don't want to grow old here and, as we're late fifties and hopefully close to retirement are thinking of making the move in the next 3 years. Our DC are late teens/early twenties so no worries about schools and presumably they won't be living with us forever (older DC has expressed interest in buying in next few years and doesn't want to stay round here either, even if he could afford it!).
However, we do love being close to London and go in regularly for days out, theatres etc and know we will miss the convenience of all the amenities on our doorstep so want to go somewhere that has plenty going on and where we can still get into London occasionally. We also need to be able to commute to NW London initially (specifically LHR for DH), until we can retire.
Our initial search has taken us up the M40 to Thame which looks like a lovely town but I'm not sure if the kind of house we're looking for exists. We currently have a large 4/5 bed 1930s semi with large garden worth approx 900k in today's market and would like to downsize to a lower maintenance newer 3/4 bed detached property hopefully walking distance to shops/pubs and good transport links for around 700-800k. The only properties I've seen seem to be on huge housing developments out of town, Haddenham being an example.
It's early days but wondered if anyone had any suggestions for areas that we could consider? Has anyone made a similar move?
Thank you ☺