Thinking of relocating from London to Cardiff - Advice please

[Sycamoretree]

General disillusionment with career, family unfriendly lifestyle, ridiculous West London mortgage and crappy catchment area lottery has resulted in our wistful musings becoming a more realistic plan to up sticks and move our family to Cardiff. DH's family are all in the general area, and it would work for us both career-wise.

Can anyone advise on nice areas to start doing some tentative house hunting/pricing in? I wouldn't want to have to commute more than half an hour. DC's are both pre-school age, so we'd want to be close to a good state primary school.

Also, what kind of price bracket would we be looking at for a 4 bedroom house with a garden in a nice area?

I'm trying to ascertain whether moving to another popular city would actually give us a better lifestyle, or if I'm just kidding myself.

ah missblythe now youre talking the riverside is great after a rugby day and your thinking now I could really do with a great chinese ..... trot over the bridge and hey presto fantastic Riverside, I agree tis fab!
You lucky thing, what a lovely house.

I quite like the bay, lots of choice for eating and some nice little bars to drink in with friends without having to put up with all the pomp (and valley-ites) in the city centre. Its where we always go when people visit us from other areas.

Hey OP you've got to come now - great houses, loads to do with the kids, good pubs (the in-laws can babysit) country and seaside walks, friendly folk (on the whole) and great culture (castles n'stuff - caerphily, castle coch, cardiff) plus theatre, dance, opera and media- go for it!

0h and restaurants a plenty!

oh and rugby n' footy!

boating....

parks yes and parks!!!!

Parks! We haven't talked about parks.

Top 3 parks for me:

1. Roath Park. How can you beat a Sunday morning in Roath Park? It's got everything! I do not know of a city with a nicer park than Roath.
2. Cefn Onn - especially in the autumn. lovely for collecting leaves with toddlers (no, I never did such Boden led parenting but one can dream...)
3. Victoria Park. I know it gets chocca in the summer but on a quieter day, in the warm Welsh sun (!!!) it's great fun in the paddling pool. Lovely place.

OP is thinking maybe Cardiff isn't for her. The locals are enthusiastic to the point of weird

We havent mentioned shops either, all the usuals plus some great little one off shops in Cardiff Bay and in Pontcanna.
Fab Learning Tree shop for kids (if its still there).
And I love all the arcade shops like Woodies, Pussy Galore, City Surf etc

rugby and football???? You forgot ice hockey!! (I can never forgive that!!) and Glamorgan cricket, rowing, sailing, tennis, swimming etc etc (although I'm only interested in ice hockey obviously )

Sorry hockeypuck, I see from your nickname that you are a fan. Too busy visiting pubs to remember all the other sports! (lol)

Priorities izyboy, priorities!

I shall however deign to forgive you in this instance

phew!

am coming a little late to this discussion - I live in Penarth and have done for 13 years now, but am originally from Birmingham - and have never had any anti-English sentiment aimed at me.

I work in an inner-city school in Cardiff (mosschops, the one where most of your asylum-seeker children go!), and it takes me about 20 - 30 minutes to get to work, depending on traffic.

I love Penarth - it's only 10 minutes on the train to Cardiff City Centre, and it's getting a more buzzy feel now.

Schools are great - my ds is at the Welsh school, and will go to high school in Barry, but I'd be happy for him to go to either of the secondaires in Penarth if we were doing the English-medium route.

The house next door to me is up for sale, too - can't put a link to it though, shame!

hi

Have read this thread with great interest

My Dh, 2 pre-school children and dog are relocating to Cardiff from SW London next spring as DH has a job at the University.

Does anyone know Caerphilly at all? We are thinking of re-locating here after renting in Cardiff while we sell our house. Have been looking at property websites and Estyn reports

I know that outside of Cardiff is less affluent, cosmopolitan etc but have also been told that some places 'up and coming' (though not which places!)

Thanks

Spanglemum

Hi Spanglemum. I personally think that the only way to really understand an area is to spend time looking around it. The valleys (and I include Caerphilly in that) are really very diferent from Cardiff so I couldn't advise you on as big a move as that (from SW London). You'd have to give it a try and see. I've lived in North Cardiff for 11 years now and my children consider themselves Welsh but I would never consider moving to the valleys - it would be just a step too far personally (although a lot of my dear friends have done so very happily)
The only way you will know if you're the kind of person to happily live somewhere is to give it a try, or move nearby and visit it a lot! Good luck with the move. I'm at the university too and Cardiff is a wonderful place.

Mmm Spangle I think you would probably find it a bit too insular.

What sort of price range are you looking at if you dont mind me asking?

hi hockeypuck and izymum

thanks for the input. We're going to rent in Cardiff for at least 6 months to get a feel for the area. It's a big move and there's no need to commit to a house/area sraight away.

We wouldlike to get a 4 bed detached house in the 250K range. This would significantly reduce our mortgage. There's a lot in this range outside of cardiff and some within. Any insights on areas of cardiff?

Thanks

spangle

3 bedders within the 250k range- no probs. 4 bed detatched not so easy. I would try Heath/Roath area for a large victorian property would probably need work tho'.

Probably a 4 bed new build on the Gwaelod y Garth estate would come within 250k. Very child-friendly estate with a bilingual primary school, catchment for Radyr.

You could also look around Whitchurch. Or up the budget to 300k which could get you something nice pretty much anywhere.