Really . Ok Will take that on board. Cheers

Not only that, the banks in the UK are a disaster. There is no end to the problems they can incurr. Lloyds shares are down 6% today due to liabilities as a result of mis-selling. Not bad for a country where financial services are its major industry.

Hi bandrui,

Don't forget it was the High Speed line that was the whole reason for me buying in Canterbury, even though it ended up taking a good ten years to reach fruition. Now the train is just three minutes on foot from my front door and 56mins from London whereas before it was often a good 1 1/2 hours. Some buyers bought in the area and ended up not even directly benefiting from it as being High Speed it tends not to stop at every station. Its route is therefore pretty critical for commuters and some property punters. Since Sandwich was mentioned as being High Speed, which it is not at this point, I corrected it but it doesn't really make me a timetable nerd in spite of some people thinking I carry flight departure times and flight numbers in my head, along with return airfares, which at one time I might have been close to being guilty of. Not you guys though!

I like Kent having lived there from around 1963 to 1975 and it still holds particular interest for me. As I told Cheers a while back I particularly like the triangle to Canterbury - Faversham - Whitstable for its walks, orchards around Hernhill and Dargate, history and unspoilt old town feel in parts of Faversham and even Whitstable (as well as its restaurants). All of the Weald is beautiful country with some very fine ancient houses. The area between Canterbury and Dover is for the most part also very beautiful, particularly around Elham.

I'm not so keen on the Dover area as I see it as a rather grubby port which, along with Folkestone, is suffering a bit of a decline, partly due to the decline in coal mining up behind Dover but also due to Eurostar. Folkestone is still a garrison town (Gurkhas). But St Margarets Bay is very popular and more pricey. I think Deal has more character and some fine Georgian houses. Sandwich is one the quaint Cinque Ports. Tenterden is very attractive but not on any rail link.

Watching now on BBC2 a program called "The Rise and Fall of the Council House"

I just wrote to my sister to see if she knows anything about this. I don't want to live anywhere near a nuclear power plant!!

I'll see if I can find it on the iplayer.

PS - Ohh I think I saw it a few weeks ago. I didn't think much of it because it really didn't give much info for current times. It was more historical.

They are a disaster in the USA as well. Actually, they are worse than that - FAR worse - but I don't want to start a political war.

My husband is over there at the moment and he was telling me there was a programme on about abuse of council housing by subletting, and developers getting in on 'right to buy'.

You are continuing to give me food for thought

I've never been to Canterbury but it is worth considering. I know nothing about its suburbs though.

What do you think?

http://www.jamesproperty.co.uk/Prope...ock/Glos/JMP28

That might be tough. They are planning to open quite a few more and England is such a small country that you won't really have a choice. They planned to open 11 originally but have now cut it down to 8.

I live 10 miles from one now, so it's no big deal to me.

That makes 2 of us! In fact I don't want to live within a say 15 mile radius of a nuclear plant. I think I need a big paper map of England and Wales for my wall that I can start putting pins in, marking nuclear plants (present and planned), drawing radius circles and marking my "would like to be near to" places, etc. I think I'll make that a plan.

Nice inside but not very turned on by the exterior. Also, hope to not be renting for long. It's probably an Ok rental price but when I rent in the short term I shall choose something small and inexpensive.

Kent itself is appealing but I'm not sure about a place to live for myself. There are places in the West and West Midlands that I think I need to be close to. I need to really re-examine my criteria again, as I do from time to time, to know where to focus my search next.

Apart from the obvious rail links, there are some good bus services in many areas which are worth checking out. They are quite efficient, not always as fast though.