Moving out of London

I'm from Manchester and have been living in SE with my wife (who's a stinkin cockney) for a decade.
We considered a move back when we found out we were having a baby, but TBH since the BBC went north MCR is LDN prices

Edinburgh for us when the push comes to the shove.
Got loads of lovely friends and business contacts up there. Could step into a job with the same salary but 60% of the expenditure.

Rise of The Idiots

pascalo
@starfish&coffee Could the zeitgeist have anything to do with the recent years of social cleansing performed by the Tories, austerity measures, welfare cuts, social housing cuts etc?

Labour are also culpable.

a lot of my friends that have grown up here (i didn't though) are all moving up to Leeds. I'd never thought I'd see the day when my mate billy moved out, because he loves it here and wouldnt hear a bad word about london. But up there his pay is essentially the same for what he does, but is rent is a QUARTER! He has a massive front and back garden, 15 min cycle from work etc etc etc.

How big are the prawns in Leeds?

Long story short, he sums up contemporary London as Geneva on Thames.

I've not read the article in question but it seems like a poor comparison. Geneva has trains which run on time, it's exceptionally clean, there are barely any non-white people, its got a huge fucking lake and mountains not far from it, it's a cultural desert and it's home to the worst dressed people on earth.

Sounds like Dulwich.

Apart from the trains running on time and mountains stuff... Sort of yeah.

mountains

checks PR on College Road

The context:

https://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/the-fight-to-save-peoples-club

Dulwich does have a nice art gallery too.. And the horniman is just up the road. See also - velodrome and stuff.

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It's a trap

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I'm not being entirely serious.

But, and I'm not sure it's the case with anyone one here (??), but for "big garden/quality of life/etc" you can usually read "schools with more kids like mine".

Which mate was that, and which pub?

I think for most people it's more about having a bit more physical and financial wriggle room. It's exhausting always being stretched to the limit the whole time. I don't need to tell you this. I've never cared about making loads of money - I just want enough.

I've lived in London since I was 6. Went to college in Aberdeen, that's the only significant time I've lived elsewhere. There will always be things about London I love, and I'm glad to be bringing up my kids here.

We (ie wife and I) are quite fortunate that we bought a house 13 years ago which we wouldn't be able to afford today, so housing is not really a problem for us. I recognise some of the complaints people are making about how London has changed, but weren't the same demographic having similar conversations in the 90s, in the 80s,maybe even the 70s? We miss things which have passed and don't always recognise what has improved...

Anyway; I'm going to retire at 50 and move to France, maybe. 300% house price increase in 10 years may help with this plan.

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White flight is usually associated with an influx of poor people to middle class areas - this is more an influx of wealthy people to middle class areas.

*Books one way ticket to France.

You have a good memory.

I get what you say and I know I'm fortunate, or at least old enough, to have got on the housing ladder when I did. When I got divorced, I took several steps backwards, but I wasn't going to leave, just changed my expectations. I'm not saying everyone can though.

I've always associated it with middle-class white people getting the fuck out of London at around the same time they start to have kids, for a better "quality of life"

• your landlords will be a nice older couple that complain about the noise and why you haven't trimmed the hedge or maintain the garden to their exacting standards.

• when you buy your family home, at the age of 27, your landlords will help you move, and they'll give you a heartwarming goodbye card and then offer you advice on how to get around the planning issues and subsidence problems you get when living in that precious little cottage that seemed so appealing those short years ago.

• when you move in, your new neighbours will bring you tea and biscuits and invite you round for dinner 'since you must be tired' and will then proceed to offend you with their tales of chasing black people out of the local shop and shooting at the pikies carts for fun.

• you can ask your friends if they want to go for a pint tonight, but because it now takes you two hours to get to the city you won't bother. any local pints have to be had with planning about who will drive and who will drink because the nearest pub is 5 miles away and you've stopped cycling because of the hills

• you can own a car, park it on your own driveway, and use it to get around because you have to.

• if you choose to you can wheel your bikes straight into your garage, rather than carrying them up an ever-narrowing pissy stairwell where they will be eaten by rats, flooded or damaged by the neighbour when he tries to drive home drunk from the pub in his combine harvester

• you can go mountain-biking without having to get the train first but you won't because all your life is dominated by trying to repair that fucking thatched roof...

• when your shopping bag breaks and your oranges roll down the street, a tractor will run most of them over and the remaining are so covered in animal shit you don't bother collecting them. Old ladies will be muttering about immigrants while mocking the 'newbies' shopping bag incompetence, loudly so you can hear, obviously.

• your commute will be less than half an hour, well it would be, if you could just find a job.

#ftfy

;-)