Looking for area, property reccomendations.

GraceD_17

royalmike said:

Take a look at Barnstaple should be able to just get what you want in budget there nice area we looked a couple months ago. Prices seem to have fallen a bit there over the last couple years and the markets very slow in comparison to South Devon which in some areas is on fire

Thank you! 
It's hard to do a simple google search of nice areas these days, I prefer recommendations from people who know the area.

Davesnave

To be fair, there are few 'bad' areas in Devon, but many of the cheaper places have some inconvenience built in, because of distance to larger urban centres. For example we do a 26 mile round trip to buy good fish & chips and shopping at our preferred supermarkets = 20 miles each way; hence many only shop once a fortnight or go home delivery. We have 3 freezers and don't work, so it's easy for us, but you're young and will have to consider employment.

You could do worse than Barnstaple or Bideford; almost coastal and with jobs available, but at relatively low wages. Torridge District has the lowest per capita wages in the whole of England, but not the inflated house prices in much of Cornwall, where incomes are also dire.

Remember too that extra 100 miles or so to the M5 is telling when you go down into that region the other side of the Tamar. It's a very long way to everywhere else!

GraceD_17

Davesnave said:

To be fair, there are few 'bad' areas in Devon, but many of the cheaper places have some inconvenience built in, because of distance to larger urban centres. For example we do a 26 mile round trip to buy good fish & chips and shopping at our preferred supermarkets = 20 miles each way; hence many only shop once a fortnight or go home delivery. We have 3 freezers and don't work, so it's easy for us, but you're young and will have to consider employment.

You could do worse than Barnstaple or Bideford; almost coastal and with jobs available, but at relatively low wages. Torridge District has the lowest per capita wages in the whole of England, but not the inflated house prices in much of Cornwall, where incomes are also dire.

Remember too that extra 100 miles or so to the M5 is telling when you go down into that region the other side of the Tamar. It's a very long way to everywhere else!

Thanks Dave, 

Employment wise, i'm almost qualified as a bookkeeper in accounts so i'm hoping to find work in that field, from the looks of things there are a fair few jobs of that type around these areas. 

I live in the country up north so i'm used to the distance to and from places, but 3 hours to London from Devon is a good commute in comparison to what was about 5/6 where i'm from. Being so young we aim to start smaller and gradually build our way up, it will for sure take time but everyone has to start somewhere. 

Our only major requirement with absolutely no wiggle room is the house having a garden and parking enough for 2 (preferably 3) cars. Barnstaple is somewhere i'm really looking into, I was looking at Blackawton and Kingsbridge but those are out of my reach for the first 5 years at least, the aim is to be somewhere coastal or close to a beachfront within the next 10 years. South Somerset is looking promising, Plymouth was at one point too but I wanted to live a little further out of the city.