What did you think of Eastbourne? It's one of the cheaper places on your list, has a good hospital, good transport including free buses for OAPs and is very pretty.

Big drop in house prices in Wales reported.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-13282978

[QUOTE=aries;9339432]I've been looking at hundreds of places (via the internet) over the past year, originally intending to return to my home town of Torquay which I know so well. Decent flats there are easily affordable, but of course it is not exactly handy to other places in England, and I stopped driving 10 years ago. It is why towns nearer to London have been in my sights for the past couple of months.

I've even considered seaside resorts which have become rundown, resulting of course from holidaymakers now travelling abroad. However, being a proud Torquinian, it is difficult to consider the likes of Margate or Southend, not my cup of tea. I've also looked at Eastbourne, Folkestone, Tunbridge Wells, Maidstone, St Albans, and many other towns every point on the compass from London. Without a car I need good access to transport, and having cardiac problems, I also don't wish to be tucked away in a village too far from a hospital.

I moved to Dover due to the lower house prices from Oxfordshire village. We moved to Oxford from Ontario in 2005. In 2008 we move to the outskirts of Dover. There are good train links to London (68 minutes from Dover) which I use when travelling on business.
I was spent my childhood living near Folkestone and there are some nice areas around Folkestone. We paid £180K for our house in Dover which would cost use £450K+ in Oxfordshire. We on a quarter of an acre plot with semi rural views.

We had Canadian friends stay with us over Easter and they enjoyed being by the sea and the North Downs pathway starts across the road from our house. There though the area was a great place to live( liked the beaches/pubs).

The hi speed train link will also now go to Sandwich, so I would recommend looking at some of the SE Kent towns.

Hudd

On the Leicestershire - Rutland Border.

This is beautiful country close to where I went to school and my dad settled (near Melton Mowbray) after I left the UK. A Bit chilly in Winter.

My only concern is the impact that the closure of RAF Cottesmore (a Harrier base) close by (4 miles) will have to the local economy. Maybe none in Wymondham.

Good connections to the A1.

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-...-29779960.html

VERY Nicely done-up!

Getting pricier but in a lovely village in Rutland:

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-...-33343148.html

I thought High Speed service goes to Ashford and then only heads up through Canterbury West and onwards to Ramsgate or you can get as far as Dover. Looking at www.thetrainline.com I have to change in Ashford to get to Sandwich from St Pancras.

We need to be careful buying in Sandwich until we know what is happening with the Pfizer property. There could be very severe job losses in the area and not just from Pfizer.

Problem with Selsey and West and East Witterings etc. is that they are south of a railway line and hold-ups at I think at what are still level-crossings, are considerable. True though that prices are a little cheaper than Chichester itself.

Ok, good to know!

That's an issue for traffic trying to get into Canterbury from the north-side (Uni and Whitstable) as there is a level-crossing approaching Canterbury West station. Often big lines there too.

Hi

Yes I can get the high speed train from Dover to St Pancras.

I've been looking at that area on the internet, and will certainly bear it in mind. Prices are indeed lower, and living by the sea again is appealing.

Do you mean Winfrith perhaps?

That was going full on as an experimental research centre when I lived in Bournemouth. We often went out that way as the surrounding countryside is lovely. It has since been de-commissioned . Not sure it was ever a power station though.

No, I was referring to Hinckley Point in N. Somerset.

As I was looking up the name of it, I came across this article on nuclear power in the UK and found it quite alarming. The UK has a heavy governmental focus on nuclear power and plans to build 8 more nuclear plants. It lists the places. The history of this is really interesting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear...United_Kingdom

Well this is a completely different area. I have spent the last hour or so looking into it.
The first property is especially nice. What I liked about both of them is that they are in villages without b---y housing estates.
This area is not so far from the area I was raised in, but day trips from there only took us as far as Market Harborough and Northampton.
I know absolutely nothing about this area. I don't think I have even ever gone through it. It might be a little North for me but the villages are beautiful.

I digressed a little into my old territory and found the riding stables I used to go to in the village of Wootton, which now has mass housing estates.
All the lanes we used to ride down are now wall-to-wall houses. So I learnt something new today... I do not want to live in a place that has new housing estates, and by new, I mean later than 30s-40s, and preferable not later than 19C.

Interesting but I do not like the conclusion: build more houses. I would much rather see house prices come down, either through lack of sales or a slight rise in interest rates. I think the most difficult transition for me will be from living in a country with endless space to one that I consider overpopulated. Anyway, it seems that there are a lot of people leaving the UK. It's like an "all change" on the population.

[QUOTE=huddm;9343641] Welcome Huddm. Well Dover, another place to consider. I haven't really considered East, or South east though my grandfather is from Maldon, Essex (a fisherman like his father). I have some West criteria but then again, when my good friend, who is moving back to the UK in August, and I were discussing where we might go, she said she was considering Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk and when I asked her why, she said; "There's people like us in these places and I need wild water." I have to find out about this "wild water" .

Pete reminds me of my Mother; she was a walking bus timetable and he is a walking railway map.

Actually, to use the vernacular, it used to freak me out as a child. She would say things like "The 155 from Renhold is late, oh well the 128 from Cambridge will be along in 5 minutes. If we get to the bus station by 1:30 we can get the 1:35 to Aylesbury. It leaves from Bay 3." I could never understand how she had all this memorised.