Choosing a city to buy property in

cwcw

You could try the south west of Sheffield and commute across town to the Rotherham office. That budget wouldn't buy you much and the traffic crossing across to the other side of Sheffield and into Rotherham (and vice versa) would sometimes be a pain, but on the upside the schools are great, crime generally low, on the edge of the Peak District yet still within 5 miles of a city centre, loads of parks and woodlands, a great place to live.

ccbrowning

Thanks, cwcw. I'll take a look there - I've worked in Derby before, but that's the extent of my familiarity with the area.

Does anyone know about Southport? It's not too far from my in-laws and the prices seem reasonable with lots of Victorian homes. Also, the police.uk crime stats are pretty good in a number of areas there...

cootuk

I grew up in Shrewsbury, and, going back there now, it's a place that is still very 'English'. Pace of life is quite a bit slower than main cities. Lots of smaller villages that are friendly.
The main downside is it's an hours drive to the M6 if you need to travel a lot.
If I could find a decent job there, i would move back.

ACG

Southport is close to preston, liverpool, manchester.

Ive only been once or twice as a kid. Its not one of those places that seems to move with the times in my opinion.

Im from Manchester so im probably a little biased but it has everything like most cities. If your offices are in Sale, you have good bus, tram and train routes. Liverpool is fairly close, birmingham and southport are only around an hour - 90 mins away.

Each City has nice and poor areas. Theyre all going to have decent transport links. If you have no roots anywhere then its a flip of the coin really. If you have family in southport then id be thinking to be relatively close to them. Do you not have friends anywhere in the UK?

ccbrowning

ACG wrote: »

Southport is close to preston, liverpool, manchester.

Ive only been once or twice as a kid. Its not one of those places that seems to move with the times in my opinion.

Im from Manchester so im probably a little biased but it has everything like most cities. If your offices are in Sale, you have good bus, tram and train routes. Liverpool is fairly close, birmingham and southport are only around an hour - 90 mins away.

Each City has nice and poor areas. Theyre all going to have decent transport links. If you have no roots anywhere then its a flip of the coin really. If you have family in southport then id be thinking to be relatively close to them. Do you not have friends anywhere in the UK?

Thanks for the help.

Nope, no family anywhere but the Northwest in Lancashire - some nearish to Ormskirk and also Leigh. I'm rather partial to Victorian houses, which does limit the location due to price band (can afford more according to the mortgage estimator sites, but feel it's silly to have such a huge mortgage!).

deckodye

I will looking forward to apply this strategies in my future real estate investment.

BigAunty

Glasgow has fantastic amenities including strong public transport provision, lots of parks(the Green city), huge arts and culture infrastructure with absolutely loads of museums, music, cinema and theatre venues, probably one of the largest in the country outside of London/Manchester. It has really great shopping facilities. It has a lot of colleges and Universities.

I live on the Southside of Glasgow in a quiet low crime area 2 miles from the city centre near two huge parks and lots of decent cafes, pubs, restaurants, a fortnightly farmers market. I have no difficulty registering as an NHS patient with local dentists and there is a hospital nearby.

One of the local trains stations takes just 6 minutes to get directly into Glasgow Central station with no stops and the other takes 11 minutes. It’s on the main bus route into town and I imagine the journey on the bus is around 25 minutes.

It doesn’t get choked up with tourists like Edinburgh, a city I also like, but which also goes mental in August with the festival. Outside of the West End of Glasgow which is the main expensive hotspot, Glasgow also doesn’t suffer the huge property prices of central Edinburgh which can be on par with London.

I don’t know how your budget would stretch in the West End (look up properties in the G12,G11 area) but within a mile or two of where I live, it will get you a huge 2 to4 bedroom Victorian tenement flat with high ceilings, open fires, dining size kitchens, stripped wooden floors and period features like decorative cornicing. Like Edinburgh, there are much fewer houses so if you were looking for a house, you’d probably have to look further away from the city centre with up to a 35 minute commute by train in.

This is what your budget might get in my local area, though be aware of the ‘offers over’ system where the vendor expects an increase above the sum published. However, everything is negotiable and some are fixed price.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-35972860.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-38185397.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-38646749.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-35715346.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-33763762.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-27614974.html

CruisingSaver

OP what about Port Sunlight Village on the Wirral? A really nice village created by Lord Leverhulme for his workers.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/Port-Sunlight.html?maxPrice=190000&includeSSTC=true&_includeSSTC=on

The houses are all Grade II listed and no two are the same. It's also really well positioned for travelling into Liverpool (15 minutes on the Merseyrail network) and has good motorway connections.

CS

ccbrowning

Thanks, CruisingSaver - I'll add that area to the list.

BigAunty:
I'll probably remove Scotland off my list. It's true that the company has offices up there, but we don't have [m]any clients so I'd basically be living out of hotel rooms. Plus, unless I go even further afield up north, the house prices seem a bit dear.

ed110220

I find Bristol itself has a slightly strange feel, maybe a bit grubby or industrial or eccentric (I can't quite put my finger on it) but many of the surrounding areas are very beautiful.