Your thoughts please

la_farfallina

breadlinebetty wrote: »

But you've got a a huge amount of equity in the property??????

You only have a 20k mortgage outstanding........:money:

There's ways round that anyway......

How long ago did you ask your mortgage company?

I asked them around six weeks ago. They said no.
Lender is GE money.

pete50_2

outskirts of middlesbrough is lovely and cheap as chips,3 bed semi with garage,garden possibly conservatory for around 120-125k,flats in these areas for around 70-90k to buy.

breadlinebetty

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Newham is East London, it is definitely not Essex: Stratford is E15 on the central line and zone 3. Barking and Dagenham are on tube lines/ have a zone IIRC.

Never been to Newham but have heard stories about it Much of the east end of London is rough.......

Dagenham and Barking is still Essex as far as I'm concerned. OK, it may be in a London Borough (same as Sutton, Surrey is) but strictly speaking no-one considers Barking as London. And all Londoners will know what I mean by that .......

breadlinebetty

pete50 wrote: »

outskirts of middlesbrough is lovely and cheap as chips,3 bed semi with garage,garden possibly conservatory for around 120-125k,flats in these areas for around 70-90k to buy.

With all due respect to people living in Middlesborough or some of the northern England areas people have suggested - there is actually a reason property is so much cheaper up there.........................;)

Also, the weather up north is so much gloomier and wetter than down south, and isn't as warm either. Sunshine etc makes a big difference I'm sure someone will pop up and say London has had its fair share of rain this year (and it has!) but generally London and the south of England has warmer, drier and sunnier weather. It's a fact.

That could be one of the reasons why some people view northern towns as depressing.

Plus you have the work situation up there - or lack of. Lower wages too....so you're not really better off.

la_farfallina

breadlinebetty wrote: »

With all due respect to people living in Middlesborough or some of the northern England areas people have suggested - there is actually a reason property is so much cheaper upp there.........................;)

Also, the weather up north is so much gloomier and wetter than down south, and isn't as warm either. Sunshine etc makes a big difference I'm sure someone will pop up and say London has had its fair share of rain this year (and it has!) but generally London and the south of England has warmer, drier and sunnier weather. It's a fact.

That could be one of the reasons why some people view northern towns as depressing.

Plus you have the work situation up there - or lack of. Lower wages too....so you're not really better off.

I think that the kind people on here are trying to help me escape the gun/knife/gang culture that I am currently living in.
As far as I understand it they have suggested up North in view of my financial situation, and the fact that, as a nurse, I can pretty much work anywhere in the Country.

Ok, I get London weighting here, but the pay difference is not huge.

I have a close friend who was an armed Police Officer and his patch was Willesden, Harlesden and Wembley.

He worries for my safety here and thinks that this area is worse...be it London, Greater London or Essex....that is neither here nor there.

My sister works in the field of hate crime, and business, shall we say, is very brisk. She is keen for me to move.

I lived in Wales for eight years and it rained pretty much most of the time. I figured that you don't get all that beautiful greenery without a drop of rain.

As my Yorkshire dad would say (well, I imagine he would if I had seen him since I was three) there's nowt as queer as folk.

Fire_Fox

breadlinebetty wrote: »

With all due respect to people living in Middlesborough or some of the northern England areas people have suggested - there is actually a reason property is so much cheaper up there.........................;)

Also, the weather up north is so much gloomier and wetter than down south, and isn't as warm either. Sunshine etc makes a big difference I'm sure someone will pop up and say London has had its fair share of rain this year (and it has!) but generally London and the south of England has warmer, drier and sunnier weather. It's a fact.

That could be one of the reasons why some people view northern towns as depressing.

Plus you have the work situation up there - or lack of. Lower wages too....so you're not really better off.

You make the assumption that those of us who live up north aren't able to make our OWN comparisons, and suggest based on our OWN experiences. I was born and raised in the south, in green belt counties and in East London. I have also lived and worked in three Yorkshire cities, including the most deprived and the most desirable. Most depressing? London.

Does a little bit of sunshine make up for the fact that when you travel on a bus or tube in London you are studiously ignored, touched up/ flashed at or pickpocketed? That as a female you'd be insane to go to a pub alone or walk through the streets late at night or set the world to rights with your minicab driver? Not for me.

Have you lived and worked up north for a decent chunk of your adult life or are you getting all your 'facts' from the tabloids? My good sized two bedroom city centre flat in Yorkshire is currently worth max £60K, my sibling's poky one bedroom South London apartment just sold for £220K. When my parents retired to Yorkshire they vacated a small two bedroom East London maisonette, buying a huge two bedroom duplex riverside apartment in a desirable village. 2007 ceiling price for the developments was £260K and £170K respectively. That's not even taking into consideration the difference in council tax and public transport! You really believe wages are that different for an equivalent job?

Most of the time it's warm and sunny you or your partner are stuck in work, not me tho because I can afford to work part time. Nor my Yorkshire relatives: my parents and both my aunts are mortgage free so could afford to take early retirement. :T

Lizling

Fire_Fox wrote: »

That as a female you'd be insane to go to a pub alone or walk through the streets late at night or set the world to rights with your minicab driver? Not for me.

Not wanting to drag the thread off topic, but that's both scaremongering and a massive generalisation. Huge areas of London are perfectly ok.

I'm female. I regularly walk home or go for a jog on my own late at night and it's fine. Going to the pub on my own isn't really something I'd do because it wouldn't be much fun, but I'd feel 100% safe doing it. And of course I talk to minicab drivers. I wouldn't pick up a minicab on the streets any more than I'd get into any other random stranger's car, but I don't think twice about phoning up the local cab company or finding the nearest office when I need a lift home.

Fire_Fox wrote: »

That's not even taking into consideration the difference in council tax and public transport!

My council tax is £397 for the year (£530 before single person discount) . In other boroughs it is more, but it isn't true to say that it's always high. Not many people anywhere in Britain will be paying less than that.

I don't need a car in London, which I would in almost any other place, and I rarely need to travel more than 10 miles. That makes my total transport bill including commuting around £40 per month. That's about half a tank of petrol, isn't it?

I'm not trying to argue that London is cheaper overall (after housing), just that it depends.

Almo

Breadlinebetty that's the second post I've seen you make suggesting that everything up north is grim and that Northerners are just the poor relations.

We are currently researching where to move back to in the UK after 5.5 years overseas and we dismissed London. I lived there previously and had a great time, it's a wonderful city but it is not the centre of the world you know. Yes, salaries are higher, but in a lot of (probably most) industries not sufficiently so to outweigh the vast differences in housing costs.

There is a small number of Londoners (although I wonder whether you're born and bred?) who think anything outside London is a wasteland and it's really quite silly. London is a wonderful city with a huge number of things going for it. There are plenty of other places in the UK which are also wonderful and have a huge number of things going for them.

pete50_2

breadlinebetty wrote: »

With all due respect to people living in Middlesborough or some of the northern England areas people have suggested - there is actually a reason property is so much cheaper up there.........................;)

Also, the weather up north is so much gloomier and wetter than down south, and isn't as warm either. Sunshine etc makes a big difference I'm sure someone will pop up and say London has had its fair share of rain this year (and it has!) but generally London and the south of England has warmer, drier and sunnier weather. It's a fact.

That could be one of the reasons why some people view northern towns as depressing.

Plus you have the work situation up there - or lack of. Lower wages too....so you're not really better off.

on the outskirts of the towns its lovely,its only the inner centre estates which you get in every city centre which are less desirable. (which aren't as bad as the media portray) i find the area a lot safer than when i was down south.The work situation is still good,especially if you've got an in-demand trade,a 25-30k job in the north east is the equivalent of 70-80k in the south.

Fire_Fox

Lizling wrote: »

My council tax is £397 for the year (£530 before single person discount) . In other boroughs it is more, but it isn't true to say that it's always high. Not many people anywhere in Britain will be paying less than that.

I don't need a car in London, which I would in almost any other place, and I rarely need to travel more than 10 miles. That makes my total transport bill including commuting around £40 per month. That's about half a tank of petrol, isn't it?

I'm not trying to argue that London is cheaper overall (after housing), just that it depends.

Differences in council tax on the specific properties I mentioned, it makes no sense to compare the value of one with the council tax and transportation costs of another. Honestly it's a fallacy you need to run a car outside London.

I don't run a car here, I have buses on my doorstep and trains three minutes walk away. In fact I haven't ever run a car so I have no idea what petrol costs these days! Thinking about it the only one of my Yorkshire 'circle' to run a car is my friend's new husband and when my ex moved up here he sold his car. My parents have a train station on their doorstep and buses three minutes walk so they don't need to run a car (tho they do choose to).

My sibling's South London apartment had a tube and rail station ten minutes walk away, buses much closer. They also ran a car but to be fair that was mostly for visiting relatives outside London. The house my parents lived in East London has a tube, rail and bus station five minutes walk away.

pete50 wrote: »

on the outskirts of the towns its lovely,its only the inner centre estates which you get in every city centre which are less desirable. (which aren't as bad as the media portray) i find the area a lot safer than when i was down south.The work situation is still good,especially if you've got an in-demand trade,a 25-30k job in the north east is the equivalent of 70-80k in the south.

And crime really varies within a ward. I am slap bang in the city centre, house burglaries are unheard of the flats just are not targeted. Muggings and pickpocketing is rare, shoplifting is rife, drunk and disorderly is obviously an issue but my little patch doesn't have many pubs and no clubs so we don't see that, it's concentrated over in the student-y part of town. Drugs are an issue but again I don't see that, plenty in the student-y area and the mini 'red light district' no doubt. Fitting in with the OP's complaints the least nice part is the proliferation of bookies.