Hi, been a forum reader for a while and thought I'd ask for the benefit of peoples experiences trying to find somewhere to live in London. Finally decided to bite the bullet and move to London after putting up with the commute from Milton Keynes for >6 months. Going to be looking for somewhere I can take my bikes with me, so I'm thinking I'll end up having to rent a place on my own? Otherwise any advice on finding a bike friendly house share? Also any suggestions on where to look in London? Kind of keen to escape out on a bike at weekends and possibly trips to the north downs for a night ride during the week. Thanks.
Depends a lot on where you work to suggest where to live..
As far as biking, you can get on the train quite easily to the hotspots.
Gumtree is pretty useful for flats.
As said above you really need to think about your journey to work as this has the biggest impact on your life (inside and outside work). After that things become clearer.
Sorry not superficially very helpful.
and possibly trips to the north downs for a night ride during the week
You'll be looking at Sarf London then
Currently working in west London near shepherds bush. Thought about gumtree, but kind of worried about storing my bikes in a shared house with people I don't really know. Guess its a case of finding a big (ish) room hopefully with a laminate floor and keeping it in there. Well that or live the dream and speed the vast proportion of my salary doing the whole bachelor pad thing... What has been other peoples solutions to being a cyclist in London? Thanks
i moved to London with a couple of bikes a few years back. I found a nice georgian house share in Camden, the room was huge so I kept them in there. Newer builds are more difficult so would need understanding flatmates.
I rent a large, elegant ground floor flat in Stockwell. It has a huge living room, in which I store my fleet. It is handy for Vauxhall, from which frequent trains depart for Dorking and the Surrey Hills. It has excellent tube connections (Northern and Victoria @ 5mins) and is reasonably handy for Brixton Cycles' excellent workshop.
You can have it if you like as I'm buggering orf. It's about £1,300 pcm, available end September.
I used to live in Hanwell W7, some 30 mins West of S'Bush. Large room so bikes inside. Current rate circa £100 p/w. Loads of totty available in neighbouring Ealing too.
I got lucky in that my flatmate has a garage which has plenty of room to store my bike. I live in Surbiton, which is pretty handy. You can get the train out to Dorking easily for the Surrey Hills, though often have to head to Wimbledon and change.
For really local stuff there a good few fun bits around Esher Common/Oxshott Heath or even Richmond Park isn't bad, all easily reachable from the door.
Did the Docklands for a year on the 6th floor of Anchorage Point (next to Cascades building) right on the Thames - great views of the City and Thames, pretty quiet and a gym and pool in the block. Not sure what prices are like now but it was a great place to live - for London.
Greenwich easily accessible, loads of pubs and restaurants around and easyish to jump onto the M11/M25 to escape to the countryside.
It's about £1,300 pcm
Shit in a bucket! I really hope that's not a 1-bed place. 😯
London rents can be incredibly expensive, although they have come down relatively in the last couple of years. I'm planning to move soon, as my current place is in an estate that's deteriorated badly in the last few months, as the police and local authority are ****ing useless. I know I can get much better for the same money. It is very handy for transport though, but that's not an essential thing for me.
If I moved out of London, which is very unlikely, I'd move abroad. No other city in Britain appeals to me at all, and I'm not a big fan of the countryside.
they seem to be going back up again Elf, round here they are anyway
Shit in a bucket!
Tell me about it... One bedroom, but the living room is more-or-less a ball-room and it's absurdly handy transport-wise. I'm profligate with places to live I'm afraid - I spend a lot of time there. 🙂
£1,300 pcm - is that all? 😉 😆
zebardy - Member
What has been other peoples solutions to being a cyclist in London?
Move out?
Really? What area? Maybe a seasonal increase mind. I've seen a gradual decrease in rental prices over the last 2 years.
If I move out, my landlord will struggle to rent this place for what I pay. He can't afford to reduce the rent, as he's mortgaged to the hilt with a fixed-rate jobby. Silly arse. Too shortsighted.
Scummy areas would be cheaper, you'd imagine, but tbh, most of the central-ish boroughs (Zone 2)will still be pricey. Speshly Tower Hamlets, Camden, Islington, Hackney, Southwark. Some nice pockets but you have to run the gauntlet of scrotes and vagabonds. Don't bother me too much, 'cos I've lived here all me life, but quite daunting to newcomers.
East Croydon. Forget the snobs. I lived in West Hampstead for 7yrs before moving down there. There are parts of East Croydon that are really nice and its a 15min train ride into Victoria (trains every 1min!).
I live in the 7 (tw) and cycle commute to work and both ride out to the North Downs/Surrey Hills and also drive (sometimes). Its easy enough to cycle in London and as long as you don't live in EC1 the journey out isn't too awful.
Surbiton - that's almost countryside... its an easy ride out to Leith Hill from there.
My bike lay almost unused in London - just didn't fancy dicing with death.
Just swan, ran and gymed a lot instead.
My bike lay almost unused in London - just didn't fancy dicing with death
Why on Earth would you want to do that? Plenty of quieter routes all over the place.
Anyway, nothing like a bit of Need For Speed: Cycle to get the adrenaline pumping! 😀
Surbiton - that's almost countryside... its an easy ride out to Leith Hill from there.
True that, but you might need a little bit of fitness to get the best out of the area.
The best I've managed was one trip up box hill from Surbiton and back, and I was reasonably tired after that. I prefer to get the train out to Dorking and do all of Pitch, Holmbury and Leith hills.
Can I just say 'Jealous from Manchester here 😀
dont just look at the underground when planning your move
the overground is often less crowded and just as handy as the tube
When I lived there I rented away from the tube or trains, so it was way cheap. I biked everywhere - it really wasn't that hard. Just like any other city but more cars and smaller gaps. Definitely not the scariest thing I've done on a bike on road.
Might be worse now tho, I dunno. This was 10 years ago.
i comute every day by bike from brentford to kensington, its really not that bad good exercise, fun and saves me lots of cash!
weve just moved further out off the tube - its so much cheaper
its also very close to the start of the m4, i can get to afan by 10-30am on a sunday morning nae probs
It's *much* easier now. Lots of bikes everywhere, drivers conditioned to it taking ages to get around. Traffic is generally so bad for cars/vans/trucks that overtaking cyclists just means watching them come back past at the next lights, and drivers seem more accepting of that.
Go elsewhere and you get way more ****ers getting agitated about you holding them up and making their journey 10 seconds longer.
Mogrips is right, there's a load of places that have poorer public transport links and are better value because of it. If you cycle, it's not an issue. It also frees up £100 a month you won't be spending on a travelcard.
I live near Finsbury Park (out towards Crouch End direction) and like it here. Midweek MTBing opportunities are few, but I just go for a run (up the old railway path) instead. Nowhere convenient for getting in during the working week has great MTBing on your doorstep - you could live out Epsom way or even further, but then you're back into doing miserable train commutes every day just so you can get out on your bike, if you can be bothered after sharing a carriage with 500 other people.
Sauf east here.
I live in the Beckenham / Bromley area. It's not too shabby.
I cycle into London everyday for work - takes about 45 mins and pretty direct routes on the ole bike. Train is about 20-25 mins.
Move out?
Here we go. Always at least one, with nowt positive to contribute. 🙄
'Oh I went to London once on a school trip in 1978 and it was rubbish and a funny coloured man looked at me and I was frightened and I wet myself'.
Jeeze. Stay away.
North East London is good for Epping Forest, it's never going to set the world on fire but from the heart of Walthamstow, Leyton, Leytonstone, Wasntead, you can be riding offroad on reasonable singletrack i minutes, tech and hilly it isn't, handy for a blast it certainly is.
Forest roads are good in the winter for just spinning out the miles on the cross bike, 30 miles is easily pretty much traffic free apart from where you cross main roads.
Surrey Hill is doable as well, 45 minutes to Waterloo hop on a train and do a ride from Dorking I can manage it and i'm not fit by any stretch of the imagination.
Close to Hoghill circuit for racing if that's your bag and very close to the New Velodrome in a couple of years!
Shepherds Bush would be a bit of a commute but doable on the Central Line or by bike, twenty mile round trip for me is fine.
weird. I just put up a post saying I was looking for a flat mate. I'm in Crouch End (North London) and have a large two bed flat with two sitting rooms and a very large garden with shed. One of the sitting rooms is basically for my bikes but plenty of room for more. Looking for about £675 all in. i.e. no bills on top.
My riding is either on the South Downs or getting train up to peaks or lakes. Or I do road training sessions from Potters Bar to Cambridge and the surrounding area.
Elfinsafety - Member
> Move out?
Here we go. Always at least one, with nowt positive to contribute.'Oh I went to London once on a school trip in 1978 and it was rubbish and a funny coloured man looked at me and I was frightened and I wet myself'.
LOL - I knew that would get you 🙂
I lived in Leytonstone and then Buckhurst Hill where, despite not being a footballer, i enjoyed myself. Relatively. I ride into work (Holborn) about 3 days a week and rode in Epping Forest every other day, some good XC routes around and up towards *thinks* nah can't remember the name of the place. Getting to ride my bike was about the only thing that kept me sane.
It's about £1,300 pcm
😯
Blimey.
That would get you a very large house out in Queensland - we're talking a mortgage/rent on a 4 bedroom, 2 living, dinning, 1700sqm plot type house in the country*.
Easily.
Mind the pay is less out here, but not that much less to be honest.
*I do commute to Brisbane.
the overground is often less crowded and just as handy as the tube
Just don't ride on the Thameslink after dark 😆
Milton Keynes and commuting in? You truly are a double-sadist Sir.
IThe ride in from Milton keynes is not as bad as you might think. Direct train from mk to shepherds bush every hour, tho still takes me 1 hour 45 from my front door to my desk. As for rental prices I'm expecting a steep climb, but the ~£400 I currently spend on trains a month should off set most of that.
More than happy to commute to work, actually quite looking forward to it (yet more evidence I'm a sadist). I think i'll have to get a map out and look at some of the locations mentioned.
Thanks for the tip on your place bigdummy, but even taking Into account the savings on trains that's still a touch more than I'd like to spend. ibnchris, that's the sort of thing I'm looking for, tho I was kind of hoping for fetish London (north downs, swinley forest...). Worth thinking about tho.
I guess another option is moving to somewhere like hemel hempsted and cutting a huge chunk off the journey.
gumtree isnt just for flatshares you know?
Hemel? It'd still be pricey AND you do want a social life in London?
I'd move to Camden 😀
You could live in Shepherds Bush...! I lived there in the Chiswick end for 10 years and used to drive ot get on the tube/train with the bike to get out to Boxhill. Some parts of SB are rather cheaper than others - otherwise try Acton or further out to the west.
Ealing area is very good for getting in and out of town. I'm in Northfields and its c25mins to Covent garden and I can be in Cwmcarn car park in under 2 hours, Swinley in 40min and Peaslake car park in 45mins. It's hardly what you'd call cheap though
friend of mine lives in a village near hemel, takes him 20 mins to get into kings cross on train. not sure of the riding round there though. i live in east herts but wouldn't recommend it for commuting into w london, considering the trains make about 17 stops just to get into central london and they are packed during rush hour big time.
surbiton for me. great for london, great for getting out into the countryside, and still expensive enough to keep most of the riff-raff out.
fetish london eh? Not sure I can offer you that but I think you might find that up the road in Muswell hill...
if you want any more info on the flat drop me an email
Suburbiton - suburban hell IMO.
I'd rather be right in the city or right out in the countryside - "halfway" places make me want to puke.
good job you're not there then - if you puke around the place then you wouldn't be wanted.
Look at the distance to work and the distance to the Dorking train line. Tooting would be quite good location. Not fare to SB and not far to get on the Dorking / London line plus not bad price wise.
Also regarding cycling in London don't be too proud to do some cycle training, you could be a cycling god off road / BMX e.t.c but cycling in heavy traffic is very different and many people do so very poorly. Modern cycle training is not like cycling proficiency. Being a good cyclist in traffic is not to do with being a master of bike control / speed just like being a good driver on the road has little to do with being a master of drifting.
Must be some good urban freeride in that london
"urban freeride" is that the new marketing mans term for street riding?
steps, kerbs, wall rides, interesting obstacles....all the things that would make a hardtail with fat slicks a good choice
So yes is the answer you are looking for.
"great views of the City and Thames, pretty quiet"
When was that then? When I have visited that great dump of noisey, filthy, horrible place there has been the constant drone of aircraft, sirens, and traffic in general... oh then theres the black bogies.
If you can't tell I never have fancied London, although I know plenty of people who moved their for jobs in their 20's and now in their 30's they want to get out!
Living on your own in london is very expensive when you consider all the bills as well as rent. House share is definitely the way to go. Search on moveflat or gumtree. Anywhere near a decent rail line to get out of town for riding.