Commuter towns to London

[Diddums]

Looking for a new place outside of London, so I can get a bit more bang for my buck.

So far I've shortlisted:

• Redhill - not the best area but not awful either
• Crawley - prefer this to Redhill but a bit more asspensiff

Anyone else got any suggestions pls?

Cheers <3


RESULTS:

(I'll be updating this OP as we go, might come in handy for anyone else)

No:
Crawley, no, bit scruffy and neglected.
Redhill, no, seems like a place where dreams go to die.
Bishop's Stortford - no, scruffy, felt neglected.
Godalming - no, lovely little town, people all looked decent, but far too dead.
Waltham Cross - no, the less said the better. What a dump.

Yes:
Farnham, yes, provided we stay on the right side of the tracks. The other side looks a bit crap, but the high street looked nice, there was a nice atmosphere, enough restaurants and shops.
Hertford, yes, but it's a bit of a commute. I might hafta move there so I can become BFFs with @Yaayuh! tho.
Guildford, yes, nice place, might have to revisit to see it again.

 

[Diddums]

Cheers for all the replies folks, I'll go through them in depth later, running against the clock atm. @Hades @ci_newman I work at South Kensington, Natural History Museum to be exact.

 

[Diddums]

Also, not sure how I feel about OP moving here - I might bump into him at Tesco

What makes you think we've not met?

Wink wink.

 

[Diddums]

Whats do you do? I was considering applying for a data analyst role there a few months ago.

I'm a night security guard, I recently discovered an ancient curse here at the museum, I think it's starting to affect th exhibits at night

Spoiler: lol

I'm the technical services manager

 

[Diddums]

Godalming is looking like a decent candidate atm. What's the area like? Anyone live around there?

 

[Diddums]

Had a mooch around Guildford yesterday, looks rather nice and I like the fact that it's perfectly situated for me to ride/drive in to work when the unions bend us over a barrel again.


Will need to check out a few more but to be honest it looks like it'll take a fair bit to beat Guildford at this point!

 

[Diddums]

Had a look at a few areas over the weekend:

Bishop's Stortford - no, scruffy, felt neglected.
Godalming - no, lovely little town, people all looked decent, but far too dead.
Waltham Cross - no, the less said the better. What a dump.

Farnham, yes, provided we stay on the right side of the tracks. The other side looks a bit crap, but the high street looked nice, there was a nice atmosphere, enough restaurants and shops.
Hertford, yes, but it's a bit of a commute. I might hafta move there so I can become BFFs with @Yaayuh! tho.

Just enquired about this place, the bathrooms look absolutely awful and it has no dishwasher but we can work around those:

Check out this 2 bedroom terraced house for rent on Rightmove

2 bedroom terraced house for rent in Barncroft, Alfred Road, Farnham, GU9 8RU, GU9 for £1,495 pcm. Marketed by Greenwood and Co, Farnham

www.rightmove.co.uk

Actually, I'll start updating the OP in case I need to refer to it, or if anyone else ever finds themselves in the same boat.

 

[Diddums]

Come live in Guildford so we can hang out

Ok

 

[Diddums]

I honestly find it weird when people post shops quantity/quality as a benefit to living in a town. Haven't you all been taken in be amazon yet and buy all what you need from there? But also, it's not much to drive to another town.

Realistically, how often are people going to towns these days for shopping? I have been just once this year. I'm excluding the times I go just for evening meals/drinks as it was shops that was mentioned.

Let me summarise this answer in to one word: "wife".

 

[Diddums]

Come live in Guildford so we can hang out

Whatchadoin on Sunday? We're heading to Guildford to check it out again.

 

[Diddums]

London is like that all over tbh.

British people are in the minority in London now.

Genuine question - when you post up stuff like this, do you actually consider anything or google anything? Does it even register on your radar that there could be actual statistics to prove you wrong and just make you look a tit?

'Cos last time I checked 60% is still a fairly decent majority.

Demography of London - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Diddums]

I know you didn’t call me, but did you go to Guildford?

Unfortunately not, no. Spent the day licking our wounds and recovering.

She seems pretty set on Amersham now though, dunno why she's written off Guildford

 

[Diddums]

Hah fair enough!

Good luck with that. North of London is scary.

Found a load of boxes for free in Godalming so went for a drive on Monday night, and I took her through Guildford on the way home and she likes it again

We seem to get more for our money there, council tax is cheaper than some of the other areas and we've since learned that there are trains to Waterloo in 34 mins, these are all excellent points.

I hear you guys all stink a bit and are a bit thirsty atm tho

 

[Diddums]

Stink?! You're thinking of Berrylands

No, guildford you stinky bar steward

Guildford area water supply disruption a catastrophe, MP says

Jeremy Hunt says fresh water should return by midday but cuts to supply had been a "hammer blow".

www.bbc.co.uk

There's some lovely restaurants and pubs in old Amersham

Amersham's lovely, been there loads and every time we come out of it thinking about how nice it is.

I often used to get the riverboat part of the way home. It's a lovely experience in the summer.

The highlight for me was when I worked at the Cutty Sark in Greenwich, it was a four hour a week contract on Friday afternoons, so I used to catch a Clipper down, smash all my work out in an hour and then spend the rest of the afternoon browsing the market and chilling around the area, the highlight was the 2012 Olympics when they had the HMS Ocean parked there. Absolutely epic.

I used to live near Amersham. It's lovely.

I now live near Guildford. It's also lovely and we are thinking of moving there. Also, for the biker, there is Box Hill and Newlqnds Corner on the doorstep and Motolegends in Guildford itself.

Yep, all nice little bonuses. To be honest this is the first time we're actually doing proper research on the area and it's a genuinely enjoyable experience. We've learned more about this area of the UK in the last month than we have in the last 11 years

 

[Diddums]

There's some lovely restaurants and pubs in old Amersham

ye but you live around there tho


I worked my arse off to get away from riff raff like you

 

[Diddums]

You're bringing London riff raff up to the shires

Ey don't maek me shank you fam innit bruv

 

[Diddums]

Ah I did wonder why there were some lit up signs saying "water collection points", but our water has been fine so I took no notice of it.

Excellent news, if we move to Gford and lose water we'll come round yours for a shower <3


I joined the Guildford residents Facebook group and there are loads of posts about it.

 

[Diddums]

MILFORD!

Part of Godalming.

3 beds, 3 bathrooms, garden, garage, £100 a month more than what we're on.

Also, I'll be saving £1700 a year on motorcycle insurance so that'll go nicely towards the absolute arse reaming we'll be receiving from National Rail.

 

[Diddums]

Come live in Guildford so we can hang out

Well I'll be down the road from you in Milford, looks like we're gonna be bffs <3