Wiltshire/Hampshire/Dorset/Somerset/Gloucestershire help!

[tapandteacake]

Hi everyone, would love some inspiration or suggestions for our relocation. I'm finding looking across multiple counties so difficult and am spending way too long on google maps.

We are looking to move out of an expensive part of Surrey, hoping to significantly "downspend" as the current monthly mortgage payment has just become too expensive, but not downsize. We will have a budget of £800,000 and will need a 4 bedroom detached house. We are looking for a rural village vibe, ideally I dream of being able to go for a lovely walk in fields or woods without having to get in the car. I love a good farmland vista.

DH can mostly work from home although may need to commute to London (by train) or Bristol (could drive there) once a week. I work from home. We had narrowed it down to areas around Pewsey in Wiltshire and that would be an ok drive back to Surrey and an ok drive to Gloucester where our parents are. However I'm not sure we can get a 4 bed house for £800,000 there. We also really don't want to do any building work as we did our current place up and absolutely swore never to put ourselves through it again.

We have a 1 year old and are hoping for more children so need to bear in mind good state schools too.

Would love to hear any suggestions of locations I should check out.

Thank you!!

pewsey has a good rail link but is less “nice” than lots of villages around those parts. You should be able to get something nice within easy reach of the station around there for your budget though. Bedwyn is lovely and also has a station though is slower. Aldbourne, ramsbury, west out to Avebury, or north to lambourne or bishopstone is a lovely, picture perfect area. The closer you get to ‘the plain” the less nice it is as a rule although there are still pretty villages. It’s remote though.

Be warned though, as you say you want to down spend country living comes at a price. Less choice of everything, constant driving between places, fewer (and so more expensive) days out / classes / hobbies etc.

Also almost all fields are full of crops or animals so you can’t just walk in them. We noticed especially during lockdown when we couldn’t travel how little of the actual countryside is accessible.

Hmm I’ve had a look and there’s not much available. I’d say this is the best of a bad lot. https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/157424231

og St A is lovely. Direct access to the downs for miles of gorgeous walks. Excellent access to the M4 (about 10 mins away). The village isn’t a through route so although it’s close to the road it’s a very quiet road with only village traffic. Good community owned pub. 5 mins to the delights of Marlborough.

I am in an uncannily similar situation. Family in Horsham and in Birmingham , we are looking for somewhere around two hours drive from each and preferably near a train station . We know Gloucestershire pretty well . Also looking for a house up to £800,000 but less if possible. We want a three bed house with a nice sunny garden , and preferably not a bland box on an estate . It seems to be a big ask and I’m not seeing anything much that interests us on rightmove. Hoping things improve in the Spring as really worry about selling but having nowhere to go to!

Looking around d Nailsworth , areas around Bath, also Worcestershire. Villages around Cirencester. It feels like a huge and daunting task. We also don’t want to have to do work . A lot of the houses online look very dated and shabby or are just very odd in some way.

That’s gorgeous. Garden a bit small and trying to avoid semi detached.

What about Whitchurch or Overton? On the main Exeter-Waterloo line, not too far from big roads. Or lots of the villages in a triangle between Reading, Newbury, Basingstoke. You could go down towards Winchester, over to Andover direction, too.

Salisbury doesn’t consider itself an army area, how very dare you!
It’s a medieval cathedral city, and really doesn’t have an army feel at all. The army area is further north, on Salisbury Plain, where all the manoeuvres take place and the firing ranges are, and where we don’t often venture! In fact Amesbury is more ‘army’, as there are several camps round there - Bulford and Larkhill, and it’s on the edge of the Plain. Tidworth and Ludgershall, also very army oriented.

There are some lovely villages along the Woodford valley - Lower, Middle and Upper Woodford, also the Chalke valley - Broad Chalke, Bowerchalke, and the Wylye valley - Great Wishford. Too many to mention all, but others nearby include Tisbury, Teffont, Dinton, Martin, Ebbesbourne Wake, Alvediston… As a pp mentioned, Salisbury is also close to the New Forest. Country living near to a city and the coast!
One of many https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/152749277

thank you, that's really helpful, I'll check all of those out. Looking at Rightmove there doesn't seem to be a huge amount there still but maybe more will come on in the spring.

I live just South of Newbury, 20 mins from Winchester and it takes me an hour to get to my daughter in Guildford. You would easily get a 4 bed around here for £800k.

I live in the north Wessex downs AONB with loads of walks on my doorstep.

I've looked at Nailsworth and the villages around Cirencester too. Also finding the same, that there's not much on Rightmove that's making me get excited to move! They all seem to need lots of work, or the fourth bedroom is tiny or they have non family friendly layouts with the bedrooms spread over ground and first floors. It does make me worry that all the good stuff is just more expensive than I can afford!

The search I used was Salisbury +10 miles, 4 bed detached, max £800,000 and I got loads!

We have recently moved to a beautiful village between Bath and Bradford on Avon and it’s absolutely gorgeous round here - connected (45 min drive to Bristol, 1hr30 train to London), stunning landscape, good schools.. I can’t fault it (yet!). It’s relatively pricey (tho not compared to Bristol where we came from!) but you would be able to get a 4 bed detached for £800k I reckon as long as you aren’t looking for period.

"lovely walk in fields or woods without having to get in the car. I love a good farmland vista."
Be careful that doesn't mean you'll have to get in the car to go everywhere else.

That's really helpful thank you, I hadn't realised the Salisbury Plain was a factor. Does that mean that Market Lavington and Upavon aren't as nice? What about All Cannings?

Do you know anything about the villages north of Newbury and a bit closer to Reading?

I worried about the Ogbourne ones getting closer to Swindon but are they still very nice? We are seeing a house in Ogbourne St George next week. Maybe that would be one to get excited about?

Ogbourne is lovely - outstanding school and in the coveted catchment area for St John's - not super near a train station though. If you're looking at Ogbourne I would also look at Aldbourne

My in-laws used to live around the Cannings and Upavon. They seem lovely but they are remote. You are going to have to drive everywhere and public transport isn’t great. Whilst that’s fine whilst the children are young, ferrying teenagers around and you can guarantee that they’ll want to meet their friends, hobbies etc. Rural schools often mean friends are widely spread. This is fine if you’re prepared to do that but don’t under estimate the time it takes! I would check out things like nearest sports centre/swimming pool etc. and how long it takes to get there.

I had a quick look - you could easily get a 4 bed detached in either Romsey or Chandlers Ford, small towns with plenty of countryside, amazing schools and if you look at the edge of the towns, you’d be able to walk into the countryside. Or somewhere like Selbourne near Alton, plenty on at your budget and you can head straight onto the Downs, but you’re not far from Alton with train station and all amenities.

I think you’ll need to take some annual leave and travel these counties, what’s great for some isn’t for others and you really can’t get a feel for a place, it’s friendliness, safety etc without being there.

Rightmove is your friend for searching for possibilities then you have the go there yourselves.

£800k in most places is fine for a 4 bed detached although again, what you mean by that is vague. Newer house? Period? Detached garage and big drive? Or next door to someone with a 3m separation? 4 double bedrooms? I’m guessing the bedrooms are used as offices as you only have 1 child, or do you need office space as well? How big of a garden do you need? How close to amenities and facilities do you want to be?

There are lots of variables and you’ll need to do more research I think. I’ve seen some questionable suggestions on MN for places others think are lovely and I would like at all. You’ll need to go yourselves to find out if it’s somewhere you could call home.

For what it’s worth, Dorset is a beautiful county, although the towns are very different, Lyme Regis is very different from Poole for example. It’s huge.

Anywhere around Winchester would meet your requirements.

Can be very rural but close to good schools (the village ones and city centre ones), and not far from Gloucestershire.

Some areas are more expensive than others but there are few 'bad' areas.

I totally agree we need to visit the places, but with a one year old that's not easy. We have a trip to Wiltshire booked for this week and hope to do as much exploring as possible. Because the search area is so wide, I hoped to narrow it down to only maybe 3 areas that we would then go and stay in. Any more areas than 3 and we'd be bankrupted booking Airbnbs!

I probably should have specified more on the house wishlist, didn't want to come across picky! We would like four bedrooms because we're planning to have two more children. We also need a study for DH. Also would love a decent size utility room and a garden I can grow fruit and veg in. Would love a 1970s or younger house - we currently have a 1930s house and have had damp and other period property problems. Also would prefer to not be on a new build site.

Also I totally love Dorset and thats where I always dreamt of living but I'm worried it's even more isolated and tricky to commute to either Bristol or London. I stayed in a village outside Dorchester once and I felt so happy and peaceful there. Do you have any suggestions for a Dorset location?

I live in a small town just outside the New Forest. The pressure to build new homes here is insane and more are coming, even though we are already way over what the schools, health services etc can support. So I'd say that if walks or even just views from your doorstep are important then you need to go somewhere where development is actually prohibited, ie close to a national park, SSSI or similar.

Country living is great but you forego a lot of things you didn't realise you took for granted. For example you may have a bus service but does it run late enough to bring you back from an evening out? Is it safe to walk to the bus stop and back in the dark? Can you just ring for a taxi and expect one to turn up? Is the cultural life healthy in its own right or based around an institution like a cathedral or university, or is it dependent on a group of ever ageing volunteers supported by subsidies that are at risk of disappearing?

For Dorset, you could look at villages like Crossways (which is Moreton Station, on the main line to Waterloo.) Or Broadmayne, Owermoigne, or up the Piddle Valley, or round Wool. Further west in Dorset will probably be too long to Surrey (takes me at least 90 minutes to fo Basingstoke to Dorchester; it can be a lot longer on a sunny summer weekend.)

North of Newbury/Reading, there are villages like Hampstead Norreys - friend drives from there to Pangbourne to get the train to London. Also places like Cold Ash. The M4 corridor and trains in thst direction are probably better for Bristol than further south. There is a line that goes up from Weymouth to Bristol through Dorchester and various West Dorset villages, but I wouldn't want to rely on it. The main line up to Waterloo is mostly good though.

You need to take some time off with a list of your criteria and drive around. I would check proximity to railway stations and main roads, plus consider schools. Do you want to have to drive everywhere? Will the roads be busy in summer? What are the chances of being snowed in for a couple of days in winter? How much of a problem could that be?

North Dorset has beautiful Sherborne, and Gillingham, both on the main Exeter-Yeovil-Salisbury-Woking-Waterloo line with a good service. No direct line to Bristol, but you can get a connection from Salisbury, or it’s a 1h 30 drive. Good luck in your search!

Ogbournes are very much Marlborough rather than Swindon. A few minutes drive or a bit of a trek along the cycle park. Being that side of marlbs makes the journey to the M4 much better as you avoid going through the town itself which is horribly congested almost all the time.

og st G is the alternative route when there is one of the very frequent accidents on the main road and more of a through route than A. Still quiet and lovely most of the time though.

The pub has closed and there no shop so it’ll be a car journey every time you need anything.

upavon and beyond is very very rural and less bougie

Sorry, couldn’t resist, I love perusing Rightmove!
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/properties/156461234