Moving Our Family Out Of The Area

*Collaborative post.

Since the birth of this blog, I have talked about moving home several times. Long term readers will know that I have moved 3 house times since I started to write and each time I’ve documented the journey. Moving is definitely one of the most stressful, yet exciting things in life – providing you’re moving because you want to and not because you’re being forced to!

We live in a pricey area. 

During the magical year of 2020, we thought a lot about moving house once more. We live in a particularly expensive area due to its proximity to London via train, so rental prices are all easily £1000pcm for a 2 bed house. Throw in pets, the need for a garden and the requirement of a school to be within walking distance, affordable housing becomes increasingly limited in our current area. 

So we thought about moving away.

For a few months we considered packing up our lives and moving away from the town I’ve lived in for the past 10 or so years. There are a whole bunch of good reasons to move: cheaper rent, bigger houses, proximity to nicer places (like the beach) and plenty of pet friendly housing available. 

Of course, moving from the area is not without its drawbacks. As I can’t drive, moving to a new area could result in me becoming/feeling extremely isolated which would leave a massive dent in my mental health. It would also mean moving schools again for Luke which I’m very reluctant to do; I just want him to settle somewhere and see school through from start to finish. 

Moving house requires a lot of time and effort.

Every other time we have moved house, we’ve had our friends or family come and help us. We’ve needed cars to transport our possessions, vans have previously been hired to transport the bigger items such as sofas and we’ve had to struggle and work our way around childcare for Luke and Oscar. 

The one thing we did agree on should we move to a new area of the country is to hire a removals company. What with only one of us being able to drive, hiring some removal experts seems like the cheapest and best way to get all our possessions from one county to another.

Using a removals company.

I looked into various specialists when we were 90% sure about our move and there are loads of brilliant companies with great reviews from previous customers. I came across a few removal specialists who seemed to genuinely care about the area they work in, like EH1 Removals who base their removals in Edinburgh. It seemed to us that hiring a removals company to handle our furniture and boxes would allow us more time to embrace our new beginnings and focus on settling into our new home without as much stress. 

There’s no stopping the roller coaster that is 2020.

In true 2020 style, our decision on whether or not to move has been a bit of a roller coaster. We’ve gone from being absolutely certain about the move to deciding to wait a few years, based mainly on Luke’s schooling situation. Unfortunately we are very aware that the house we moved into at the beginning of the year is likely to be sold as the owner has sadly died. Her sons are in charge of the letting and we were given the impression after we moved in that they would be looking to sell the property as soon as possible. Not knowing whether we will be kicked out of our home next February weighs heavily on my mind and I just hope that we can continue to stay here so that we can continue to send Luke to his new school. 

I have no idea if we’ll be able to find a new home if we are forced to move.

If we do need to move, we will be on the hunt for somewhere close enough that we can still walk to his new junior school, although I fear we won’t be able to find something that accommodates all of us. Having pets and needing a garden really limits your choices, which I do think is silly. There definitely needs to be more affordable family housing in towns and landlords need to accept that if they’re letting a family home, that family is likely to have a pet or two! 

I guess we will just wait and see what happens!

Until December or January though, we won’t know what we’re doing. Which I have to admit really sends my anxiety sky high! All I can hope for is that due to the current economic climate, the landlady’s sons may not wish to sell the house as it won’t be worth as much as it once was. Plus, at least having good tenants paying £1000 a month their way can’t be such a bad thing considering the state of the country at the moment! Here’s hoping we can stay, we all love the house and the area so it would be a real shame to move.