in which city/area would you wanted to live and why?

verulamium

I currently live in a suburb in South East London. I know London gets a lot of hate but whatever. I would still live here if I was given a choice to move anywhere else regardless of job situation. Just like any city in the world, London has its bad and good sides. I am thankful to be able to move to a residential part of London that is (mainly) good, isn't' too pricey (yet) and isn't in a touristy area.

I grew up in a city (not London) so I am used to urban living. We tried living in a market town in Hertfordshire for a few years and found that it isn't for us. In fact, parks are plentiful in London and at times it doesn't feel like I am living in London. Best of all, it's just 15 mins train ride to the West End and East End, and not too difficult to get to the Kent countryside.

itch_for_a_glitch

For many people its an age thing, when young you can live anywhere, for lots of people you get used to the feel of an area and the people in it, leading you not to want to move and being irritated by too many incomers changing the "feel".
If you look on the property websites there arent many areas you cant live in for £200k We have lived in the same village for nearly 30 years, memories, friends,relatives and the "feel" are the things keeping us here, the only thing I can think of to make us leave would be a large influx.

Woodyrocks

verulamium wrote: »

... Best of all, it's just 15 mins train ride to the West End and East End, and not too difficult to get to the Kent countryside.

15mins to W&E End you say. Do you mind me asking where in SE London you live?

savier

am I the only one who finds countryside boring?

Road_Hog

mikeollington wrote: »

What can you say? It has to be Birmingham...We have more canals than Venice (though their canals probably don't have trolleys in them).

And more baltis than Bengal.

moneyistooshorttomention

itch_for_a_glitch wrote: »

For many people its an age thing, when young you can live anywhere, for lots of people you get used to the feel of an area and the people in it, leading you not to want to move and being irritated by too many incomers changing the "feel".
If you look on the property websites there arent many areas you cant live in for £200k We have lived in the same village for nearly 30 years, memories, friends,relatives and the "feel" are the things keeping us here, the only thing I can think of to make us leave would be a large influx.

Some valid points there. But...I couldn't live in my home area for £200k (well...I could...but that would have meant staying in a starter house and not having A Home).

We had a large influx and I could see it getting worse. I didn't feel safe in various ways there any more. Bad enough of itself...but totally unacceptable for an area that is my Home Area iyswim.

It was good to get rid of bad memories in moving...though I would have preferred to stay with friends in many ways. Hopefully a good friend of mine will move here and join me:).

One of the things was that Home City feels like a "young persons city" in various ways. Its a bit of a mental adjustment here...where it feels "older". I have got older myself over the years obviously....but I don't think it used to feel so "young". Part of all the incomer stuff going on I think....

My eyebrows went up at a recent "member of public telling it as they see it" shortie tv programme. He quite openly said "When we first came here then we had to adapt and try to integrate. Now there are so many of us here then we don't feel the need to integrate any more". Those weren't quite the exact words...but that was the VERY clear message......WHAT?!!!

itch_for_a_glitch

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

My eyebrows went up at a recent "member of public telling it as they see it" shortie tv programme. He quite openly said "When we first came here then we had to adapt and try to integrate. Now there are so many of us here then we don't feel the need to integrate any more". Those weren't quite the exact words...but that was the VERY clear message......WHAT?!!!

I didnt mean foreign immigrants, I meant "new" people, ours is a settled community, kids leave of course, but adult turnover is very low, primarily people leave feet first. This means newcomers are at a rate of a couple of properties a year which leads to the newbies being easily absorbed, umless they dont want to be, of course.
Cities I guess would be much more fluid, and so to me less attractive.

ThemeOne

As a teenager I was desperate to move to London, which I did at the age of 19, and have spent most of my adult life here.

There's little doubt in my mind that it's a very good place to live in terms of work opportunities - it's still the case that certain jobs only really exist in the London area.

I used to enjoy London in other respects too e.g. the diverse population, the juxtaposition of rich and poor areas, but these days I see this in more of a negative than a positive light - the result no doubt of changes both in myself and in society.

I'm genuinely unsuer where I'd like to live now - a big part of me feels it would be somewhere out of the UK but, again, I don't know where!

Nebulous2

Jonbvn wrote: »

According to the linked article Bristol is "best".

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/10386993/Bristol-is-best-city-to-live-in-the-UK.html

From a very limited sample. Aberdeen consistently scores very well on a range of factors:

http://www.scotsman.com/news/scotland/top-stories/aberdeen-top-place-in-scotland-to-live-and-work-1-3192009

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2509330/Reading-Aberdeen-Southampton-best-quality-life-UK.html

http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2012/nov/24/aberdeen-happiest-place-scotland

phoebe1989seb

Currently own a 200 year old house in an area of outstanding natural beauty in Wilts, close to the Dorset border (Shaftesbury is our nearest town). We have fields to the front and rear elevations and an award-winning village store not far away.

Personally I'd much rather be in London though, as despite the gorgeous countryside there just isn't enough to do here culture-wise for me

Best times over the last year have been spent with DS (who lives in SW London) to visit exhibitions, theatre etc. Despite never living there I consider London my spiritual home as it has all the culture and architectural history that interests me and just so much to see and do.

We've previously lived in Essex - hated it - and Hampshire.....I was born & grew up in Southsea. Portsmouth itself is a total hole, but Southsea is quite nice.......although we would only move back there if we could have our old home back but we could no longer afford it since stepping off the employment treadmill in order to set up our own business and work shorter hours.....still it's great to no longer have a mortgage tying us down.

Conversely, DS hates living in London and will be selling up to move to Brighton in 2014........and that's only to keep his GF happy, as he'd really rather live somewhere rural but her work is city-based.