@unfitgeezer – a 1-bed for £850 ! for £750 you can get a nice 2 bed with underground parking in Clerkenwell.

@unfitgeezer – a 1-bed for £850 ! for £750 you can get a nice 2 bed with underground parking in Clerkenwell.

£850 where ?

Lol, define bandit?

Not my words ask CaptainFlashheart his words 😉

oohf. I’d not looked at the floor plan – assumed that had a few bedrooms. Would be a great place to live though.

£850,000 for a tiny 1-bed flat? 😯

You could get a 4/5-bed townhouse with garden in somewhere like Crouch End for that money. And even that’s insanely expensive.

Is this bandit country money

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-40963985.html

Nice little London pied-a-terre, that. 😆

Difficult one. IMO it is a bit of a fallacy to think there is a good option for London living – if you have to travel into London to work, you either pay through the teeth for centrally located property, or suffer a long and expensive commute. Have done both, not sure which one is really the best option, but if I were only in London for a short time I would be tempted to stay in the centre, if I had the cash (which I don’t).

Have lived in Docklands (Canada Water/Surrey Quays). Easy access to London, but soulless and next to some pikey areas. At least Grennwich has some charm, the river and a few good pubs. Blackheath also on the list of nicer spots in East London.

I now live miles out (Haslemere) and the price of our 3 bed home would not even get us a two bed flat in London, even in the semi-crap areas. Commute does take 1hr 30 to 1 hr 45, depending where you are headed. I am lucky that I only go into London infrequently, where as when my mrs goes back to work, she will need to do that 3 days a week.

I liked Edinburgh when I visited, thought it had a nice atmosphere compared to London and lots of greenery you can actually see. Was thinking about moving to Bristol area, but my wife can’t get an easy move with her job and we both need to work. Maybe go ‘trendy’, grow a beard and live in Shoreditch?

Thanks for the advice folks – plenty to think about there. I’m not intending to abandon Edinburgh completely as I’m going to keep a flat here. For London I really don’t want to do the hour+ commute thing – I’d reckon if I did the last thing I’d then want to do is come into London at the weekends, and I’d really like to makee use of what’s there.

The commute thing is key really –

Zone 1, property expensive/small – walk to work. Minimal commute times.

Zone 2/3, can have living style ranging from gritty and urban (Brixton? East End?) to distinctly leafy and suburban (Dulwich? Blackheath?) to soulless new town (Docklands). Commute of 30-60 minutes by bike or public transport

Zone 4+ out to commuter belt – more space, easy access to country, commute of 45-90 minutes or more.

Middle one works for me – I ride a bike almost every day and rarely use public transport. Getting out of town takes time but I’m only doing it once a week. Having hills on my doorstep but spending c15 hours + each week on commuter trains really doesn’t appeal.

Thanks for all the advice. I’ve decided to rent for the first 6-months or so until I get a better feel for the options. We’re headed down to take a look at some places next weekend, focusing on two main areas – Blackheath and nearer the office at St. Katherines Dock.

West gets you out to Surrey easily at weekends.

Hardest part is snapping up a place before someone on the phone to a housing agent, who hasn’t even seen the property gets in before you.

If you can cope with a 40 mins commute you could live in Berhamstead, which is a great town and has a thriving MTB club.

How about north of the river……….About 200 miles north! Nice people, value for money, not London basically.