Living next to a road or railway line - how much is a deal breaker is it?

SG27

How long do you intend to stay? Take a very long term view and buying next to a busy road may be a good idea. In 20 years time I expect most vehicles will be non polluting quite electric ones. So the road will have much less of an impact.

SensibleSarah

Both are a dealbreaker for me, as I have cats. So not an issue for noise reasons. If I live in or near a city I expect the noise issues.

AdrianC

SG27 wrote: »

In 20 years time I expect most vehicles will be non polluting quite electric ones. So the road will have much less of an impact.

A lot of the current drive-by noise is tyre and wind noise, so will still apply to electric vehicles, rather than mechanical noise. Modern cars are very quiet, mechanically.

Candyapple

I have lived next to a busy road and never again. In the summer if I wanted to open the windows in the lounge, I couldn’t watch TV or a film without cranking the volume up ridiculously high because you couldn’t hear anything over cars whizzing past every few minutes and that was even in the late hours of the evening. Even at night, I had to sleep with ear plugs if the window was open. It was really stressful, you don’t realise just how much noise pollution it is until you experience it. I now live in a very quiet road and the difference is night and day.

I viewed a lovely house once and was keen to put a bid on it when I went out to the garden which backed onto a motorway and the noise was mental! You couldn’t hear it inside as they must have had some really good triple glazing or something but the thought of not being able to use the garden in summer or even just having the kitchen back door open was too much.

As for railway line, I guess it depends on what type of train, how frequently they run and how close by they are.

Robinette

I've lived near a railway, which didn't bother me, and now live on a busy main road, which again doesn't bother me. Like someone else said, I got more house for my money; in addition, I look out over a park rather than a row of identical houses as I would in a quieter residential street.

Everyone has their own deal-breakers and compromises they are willing to make.

Yellow_mango

Remember that the noise from a busy road is not necessarily limited to traffic. In a town / city you can also get a lot of late night noise from people leaving pubs etc.

phoebe1989seb

I wouldn't buy a house on a main road again.

Our last-but-one house - in a village in an area of outstanding natural beauty, on a rural A-road - regularly shook throughout its three storeys as traffic hurtled past, often over the 30 mph speed limit. It was a solid, thick-walled, Georgian stone house but even with the acoustic glass double glazing we fitted you could still hear the road noise. Fortunately the garden was huge and backed onto open countryside so it was relatively peaceful out there, but you could always hear the distant rumble of approaching hgvs

I never got used to the traffic noise and every surface of rooms at the front were regularly coated in black dust from the road.

When we sold, our buyers - who loved the house and paid the full asking price - admitted they couldn't have afforded it had it been in a more peaceful road. We made money on what we'd paid, but the price we asked reflected the location.

Actually one estate agent refused to come out to value it because of the location, saying their buyers - the London second home set - wouldn't consider a house on a main road

Cakeguts

If you get a house cheaper because it is near a railway line or busy road then you just sell it cheaper too.

s34rle

I lived at the back of a Met line for a couple of years. It had a fairly large garden which backed straight on to the tracks. Got used to the noise. It was a bit noises at the back of the house in bedroom but couldn’t hear anything in front bedroom. Garden was probably 100 foot as a guess

Throwaway1

I lived for 9 years with a house backing onto a railway line, I didn't actually know it was there when I first moved in! It completely depends what type of train is passing, generally you could just about hear them going past every 20mins or so but 1 every 2 hours was a 'fast' non stopping train so that one was a bit louder but still no bother.



I wouldn't want a house on a busy road, not so much because of the noise but I don't like the thought of pulling off/getting onto the drive on a busy road.