buying a London flat- doing the right thing?

Jumping_Bean

What ever you do, don't buy.

We're just at the start of a painful housing crash. You're a first time buyer with a decent deposit. You're in the best possible position you could be. Don't **** it up now.

You say you've been prompted to look at buying due to falling prices? Can't you see what's wrong with that sentence? You're going to buy something *because* it's falling in value?

You say it took 7 years for you to save £75,000. What a waste it would be to just throw it all away.

Think very carefully before you jeopardise / ruin your financial future.

pickledpink

byrneand wrote: »

I think this is a bit extreme but what your saying is kind of true. It is all a comparison though. Clapham/Wandsworth is a lot nicer than 80% of London (e.g Bermondsey, anywhere east of Liverpool St, anywhere north east of Highgate, anywhere west of Holland Park... making very sweeping statements and not including absolutely lovely pockets).... Compared to the majority of other cities in the UK though, Clapham/Wandsworth would be considered to be in the least desirable 30% in terms of crime levels, standard of streets and community (bearing in mind I'm from Liverpool!). To my eyes and having a number of friends who live in the area in terms of house size and design the area in reality terms is actually fairly similar to Toxteth/Smithdown Road in Liverpool or Fallowfield in Manchester (with the exception of an additional Nando's or Bodean's kicking around).

The prices in London are inflated and that's because their are more people wanting to live there than there are houses - it's fairly simple supply and demand stuff. When you couple this with the higher salaries available in London it means people are prepared to pay more.

People seem to be suggesting that x or y is better because it's cheaper than Clapham and only 10 minutes further out. What people don't take into account is that that additional 10 minutes is actually making the journey at least 30% longer each day.. coupled witht the facts that it's not as easy as just looking at the nuber of tube stops since the distance between them is almost exponential as you move between zones (bit of exaggeration but you get what I mean!) means the average time it takes to get to a tube station from a home is longer as the network is less dense.

People need to make decisions based on their own circumstances and priorities. Carolt et al, these may not be the same as your circumstances and aspirations are all different.

Balham isn't ten minutes away from Clapham!!:rotfl: They border each other and the distance between Clapham South Underground and Balham Underground (which is the next stop) is about a minute! Balham also has BR which takes just 15 minutes to get into Victoria.

Many people who live in Balham walk up to Clapham South as it's Zone 2 (Balham is Zone 3) but equally, many people who live in Clapham walk down to Balham for the overground.

Balham has some beautiful properties (just as Clapham has) and you'll find it's mainly professional people living there. Of course, like anywhere in the UK you'll have your odd pockets where crime is rife, but predominately both areas are as safe as anywhere else.

pickledpink

meester wrote: »

Of which there are plenty in that area.....

My parents used to live in Clapham Junction, ugh, the helicopters flying over head (to catch the criminals), the scummy people everywhere, and when I went to visit the doctor in Balham, it was even worse, a lunatic running down the road with a knife, and when I went to the doctors, to even get in the surgery, the door was on a chain, which they opened with the chain on to be sure they weren't going to be murdered or attacked by some nutcase (not quite sure why they put up those posters saying 'please don't attack our staff', I doubt the scum can read).

Oh stop exaggerating, Meester!!!:rolleyes:

The reason you see lots of helicopters flying over Clapham Junction is because it's 2 minutes from Battersea Heleport. Businessmen fly in and out of there every day.

As for you claiming the doctors' surgery had the chain on the door..........I find that hard to believe! My ex-doctor and dentist never had to lock themselves in..............maybe someone else gave them the heeby-jeebies!!!!:p :rotfl:

pickledpink

Here you are, Meester.................take a look at this house in Balham.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-21542957.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

Would you call that poxy?:D

LillyJ

pickledpink wrote: »

Here you are, Meester.................take a look at this house in Balham.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-21542957.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

Would you call that poxy?:D

Oooh that's lovely (especially the garden). I know it is a huge amount of money but compared to what you can get in some parts of the Home Counties, doesn't seem to bad.
I know Clapham fairly well (about 90% of my old school year seemed to migrate there on mass when they left uni), but not Balham.

GracieP

pickledpink wrote: »

Here you are, Meester.................take a look at this house in Balham.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-21542957.rsp?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy

Would you call that poxy?:D

That is more Streatham than Balham. And Streatham is an absolutely awful place. I wouldn't buy that house for £200k (unless I could flip it quick smart ) as I wouldn't live in Streatham if I was paid to.

byrneand

pickledpink wrote: »

Balham isn't ten minutes away from Clapham!!:rotfl: They border each other and the distance between Clapham South Underground and Balham Underground (which is the next stop) is about a minute! Balham also has BR which takes just 15 minutes to get into Victoria.

Many people who live in Balham walk up to Clapham South as it's Zone 2 (Balham is Zone 3) but equally, many people who live in Clapham walk down to Balham for the overground.

Balham has some beautiful properties (just as Clapham has) and you'll find it's mainly professional people living there. Of course, like anywhere in the UK you'll have your odd pockets where crime is rife, but predominately both areas are as safe as anywhere else.

Clapham is not as safe as anywhere else:

http://www.upmystreet.com/local/police-crime/l/Clapham-86533.html

It has a car theft rate 65% higher than the national average and a burglary rate 139% greater than the national average.

If you compare this to wavertree (which is the closest place to toxteth i could find using google)

http://www.findaproperty.com/crimefacts.aspx?edid=00&salerent=0&areaid=6531

It has a car theft rate 75% higher than the national average and a burglary rate 110% greater than the national average.

I'm just pointing out Toxteth is percieved to be "not the greatest place in the country to live" and rightly so. Clapham and Balham compared to so many places in the country are not that great. People choose to live there because of its proximity to the city and the opportunities that this provides be them financial or creative (e.g. fashion, advertising etc..) that you cannot get elsewhere in the country.

As per TFL the journey time from Clapham north to Balham is 6-7 minutes and so it varies a fair amount. The point I was trying to make was that it makes your journey time significantly longer. Take a journey from Bank for instance:

Bank - Clapham Common: 17 mins
Bank - Balham:21 mins

The journey to Balham is 24% longer.

I lived in Clapham for 2 months when I first moved to London and have a number of friends there. When you come off any of the three stops there tends to be groups of youths on bikes, in hoodies. The fact that in my 2 years in London I know of 4 people who have been mugged in the Clapham area compared to 0 in 3 years in manchester and 2 in 23 years of living in Liverpool I would draw my personal conclusion that it is more dangerous (especially when coupled with government statistics.

i just popped clapham crime statistics into google and this was the top search result:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2124789.stm

The quote "According to the statistics, the London borough of Lambeth - which includes Clapham - is the worst robbery blackspot in England and Wales. " were quite conclusive for me.

You are correct in saying that both Clapham and Balham have beautiful buildings which I would not begin to dispute... in the same way many areas in the uk do be they be perceived as being rich or poor areas.

LillyJ

byrneand wrote: »

You are correct in saying that both Clapham and Balham have beautiful buildings which I would not begin to dispute... in the same way many areas in the uk do be they be perceived as being rich or poor areas.

You are right there, Handsworth in Birmingham has some lovely 3 storey Victorian villas. It also has race riots and car jackings.

Gangstabird

Something that would really worry me about your purchase is that you offered £70,000 below what the asking price was, in just 2 weeks, it was accepted. How long did it take you to save your deposit of £75,000 because if it took a few years, you have just found out how to lose it in 2 weeks. Just hold on for a while more. You will be pleasantly surprised.

GracieP

byrneand wrote: »

The quote "According to the statistics, the London borough of Lambeth - which includes Clapham - is the worst robbery blackspot in England and Wales. " were quite conclusive for me.

To be fair Lambeth includes Streatham and Brixton which are both horrible. In particular Brixton, which is an irredeemable hellhole.