Moving out of London

Yes it’s pretty bad at the moment with no real possibility of improvement on the horizon, we’re hearing that there are currently 3 day queues at the border for people trying to get out!

Where abouts are you in Yorkshire? I was born/spent my first 12 years in Harrogate. Don't get back there that often but not a lot beats the countryside in the county.

We have spent quite a bit of time there in and out of season, though a large part of its appeal is/was that we would ha 4 or 5 months off during winter.

Costa Rica is currently high on our list. I’ve been to see a few places one of which had 5 acres and stunning views from the mountains across to the Pacific, I have another much smaller one to see today which is in the cloud forest and is owned by descendants of the original quakers, I’m really quite excited.
As you say the cost of living can be really quite expensive. We did live in Latin America for a number of years and had discounted returning as we figured our daughter would make her life in Europe, but we have really gelled with the place on this visit, so who knows.

Ha! Well not that it's funny, but there goes my suggestion.

It depends where you are. If you're opening a hostel in a nice outdoorsy bit then I think you are comparatively safe. Other practical problems are the strength of property rights, buerocracy, and shit lawyers.

So yeah to emigrate I'd choose CR all day long.

It also has the largest urban park system in North America

This would really surprise me. So I had a look around. I don't think it's the case.

On balance its got so much going for it. Idk what sort of return you'd get from your initial outlay, but if you can cover your cost of living it struck me as genuinely livable out of the Central Am countries (assuming you want an outdoors life). Easy to get to Europe, the States, and South Am too.

Yeah I looked into that again and it seems like it comes down to a case of semantics and how different studies collect and intepret data.

Regardless, between the park land that's available, plus the lake, the islands and the green space thats a 1-2hrs our of the city, I find it covers everything for me and I seem to get out in it and use it a lot more than I ever did in London. This maybe down to lifestyle change though.

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/jul/11/so-disappointed-john-cleese-to-quit-uk-for-caribbean

I’ve just come back from viewing the house in the cloud forest and my mind and heart are truely blown away, small but amazing and the views are amazing.

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Few questions, myself and the GF are thinking about leaving London in a year or so, she's Swedish, so that seems the destination for sure, maybe back via a short stay in the Midlands, that's me, I'm on of those freaks. Has anyone here moved to Sweden or to that general area, infact just moving abroad in general, what do you do with your stuff? I have computers/bikes etc. I know I can sell what I really don't need but there is obviously some stuff I want to keep!
Thanks in advance!

Quit London (usual reasons) for the US a couple of years ago, just in time for Brexit then Trump. Friends in other countries have half-jokingly made me swear never to move to their respective countries. Not a bad place to live, though healthcare is an unmitigated shit show on every level, and always will be. Would be nice to live in a smaller/cheaper city, but then finding good work is more difficult, and with so much tied to employer the risk is high. I actually miss the weather in the UK - summer heat means next to no cycling 3 months of the year. Pining for winter here.

@Citron
Mind if I ask what you and your partner do for a living? And whether you plan to carry on that occupation if you move to Costa Rica? Whatever it is I am really envying your sense of flexibility right now.

Has anyone here moved to Sweden or to that general area

Isn't @kboy an ex-pat in Sweden? Sure someone on here is.

@RangerRussell I'm no ex-pat, but I'm a Swede who spent 10 years in London and then moved back, so not far off :)

More than happy to answer questions - fire away!

It's probably not as explicitly and vilely expressed, but there is certainly an underlying suspicion of difference among certain people in some villages and towns of rural England. With terrible (and deteriorating) rural bus services, people on low incomes or jobless and without a car are seriously isolated. My mum, a retired teacher, regularly met kids who had never left the county - sometimes never even been to Cambridge just a few miles away. Easy to forget when you a baller.

My parents use a painter and decorator from a nearby town. He was working on a window frame outside their house. Their cleaner - an ostensibly lovely women well into her 80s - rushed in an exclaimed, "Dave, there's a black man up a ladder outside!". Was she suspicious of him? Dunno, but the mere fact she mentioned his skin colour goes to show that seeing not-white people is still a novelty in some places.

Knowing what we know now, we would have traded space for location and moved either to a town or a village with a train station.

Dunno, but the mere fact she mentioned his skin colour goes to show that seeing not-white people is still a novelty in some places.

This is true. My most memorable experience of this wasn't even with someone well into middle aged either.

Wen't to uni with a guy who was lovely by all means, but grew up in a a village in an all country township! One day we drove down to London, through Tottenham to show him my old stomping grounds, mid summer, windows rolled down, with him loudly, and genuinely exclaiming with surprise "wow, I've never seen so many black people in my life!"
Heads turned pretty sharpish.
I'm 100% sure it was said in the most positive of ways but it was still a strange thing to hear, as I'd never really considered such a perspective before.

the reverse happened to my mate who moved to the deepest white countryside from London when he was about 9: "dad why is everyone white here?".

Your first winter in Sweden will kick you in the nuts (hard), but then when you fall in love with Swedish summers you'll understand why people live here.

Generally I've found that people here have more respect for each other and their surroundings compared to the UK. It could be due to that the population of London is larger than the whole of Sweden so there's space to breath here, less of a dog-eat-dog mentally. It is slowly changing for the worse though unfortunately.

Although many Swedes speak excellent English, you should learn Swedish, you'll get fed up with learning it, but keep at it and one day you'll notice it just flows.

Great place to raise kids if that's on your agenda. And health services, although far from perfect, piss on the UK.

Probably not the right forum to mention this but one thing I love about Sweden is the huge American car culture here (I grew up on Dukes of Hazzard and Smokie and the Bandit).

^ Pretty good low down there

@bmx - you in sweden? Whereabouts?

Thanks @kboy Sweden works for me.
Göteborg first, currently in Eskilstuna living the suburban family life.

Where abouts?

All this chat about "ooh look at the black person " in the countryside. I guarantee you this shit happens in London, it might not be vocalised or it might not be vocalised in the languages you understand but it happens. Ive heard London kids saying unacceptable things in elephant and castle Sainsbury's.

No doubt. My perspective was more personal shall we say, as in it's something I grew up not having to think about, so I'm just highlighting my obliviousness to other people more than anything.

what do you do with your stuff?

My experiences;

This time we were lucky as we have a decent loft and outhouse. But first clear, sell, etc. what you can. Do this in stages each evening - eg clothes are seasonal so you already have a load you're not going to wear for 3-4 months, even if you want to keep them.

Furniture is much harder to get rid of than you'd expect, so budget plenty of time for this stage. Try and sell it, even if you're happy to give it away as 90% of freecycle people are lazy cunts. I had more success on here than on my local freecycle even though everyone has cars and journeys would have prob been 20mins max.

Bigger things you want to keep, try and palm off to friends/family. When we took a year traveling we had less stuff, but between various friends and family housed any important stuff.

Lucky you can just drive a van so there are less restrictions.

Definitely look at the cost of purchasing things in your destination country. I should have brought a bike as even a shit bike is +$100 and a mid range road bike is almost as cheap new off wiggle as a 5yr old one on Craigslist. Also is there stuff that's economical to take which you can sell for more money in your destination country - again I should have spent £50 on bike transport, brought 2 and sold one.