Working in Surrey

[peacefuljourney]

Greetings. I will be relocating to the UK to teach in Surrey. I have a 12-year-old son. I'm looking for housing to resnt for the first year or so. Does anyone have any thoughts on possible areas that are not overwhelmingly expensive, but pleasant enough for a 12 year old to feel comfortable but not bored? That's a conundrum! Thanks for the advice.

[MichelleAlison]

Have a lookat this link for housing Properties for sale, homes to rent, overseas property, retirement properties and new homes on rightmove.co.uk. The website covers the whole of the UK.

Regards

Michelle

[Elphaba]

Whereabouts in Surrey? It is a fairly large county and you don't want to be spending too much time travelling to & from work.

From an ex-Surrey resident

-

[peacefuljourney]

I'll be teaching in the Cobham area. My biggest concerns are cost of housing and proximity to the metro. Thanks

[jlms]

Originally Posted by peacefuljourney

I'll be teaching in the Cobham area. My biggest concerns are cost of housing and proximity to the metro. Thanks

IMHO you could not do any better than to try to live in the town where you are going to work, unfortunately I don't know Cobham, having said that Surrey is a well off area and in general is good to raise children. You may be bored to death, your town or village may not have a cinema and if it does you will have only commercial movies, in general there is no real cultural life to speak off, but if that is not a worry you should be fine, in any case London is half an hour away but for children is not too bad since there are plenty of leisure centres and green areas .

Second best is to live in another town that is in the same train line as the one where you work. Check the train company's timetables (South West Trains) to see trains that would pass through Cobham for alternative places where to house hunt.

In Surrey there is no metro, there are trains with stops normally quite far from each other and buses, with a varying degree of reliability, most people rely on a car, specially if they live in a small village, although nowadays you can order your shopping delivered to your door from all major supermarkets and if you are disciplined you can get some use from the buses, but the fact that they are used mostly by pensioners, children and people in low incomes should tell you that a bus, regrettably, is not the best means of transport for busy people living in Surrey.

Hope this helps.

[peacefuljourney]

Thanks for the responses. I appreciate the assistance. PJ

[Elphaba]

Originally Posted by peacefuljourney

I'll be teaching in the Cobham area. My biggest concerns are cost of housing and proximity to the metro. Thanks

Cobham is nice. The nearest big town is Woking, which has cheaper housing and a fairly fast train service to Central London. Woking has a decent enough range of shops, a cinema and a theatre.

Traffic in the area can be fairly heavy, so I would recommend living as close to work as possible. By metro do you mean underground? It is way too far out for that, but there are many train stations in the area.

Overall it is a good area, although fairly expensive. Not a bad place to live or bring up children.

Good luck with your move. Let me know if you'd like some info on places to see and visit in the area.

-

[peacefuljourney]

Elphaba - I noticed you're @ Dubai? I'm @ Abu Dhabi. Small world. "Metro" I mean train, rail, anything other than the bus! Elphaba, from "Wicked"? Thanks - PJ

[Elphaba]

Indeed Elphaba from Wicked. One of my all time favourite books.


If you are in Abu Dhabi, I am sure you could help us out on the Dubai & UAE forum. There are often people wanting to know abut AD. Please pop in sometime.

[peacefuljourney]

Originally Posted by Elphaba

Indeed Elphaba from Wicked. One of my all time favourite books.


If you are in Abu Dhabi, I am sure you could help us out on the Dubai & UAE forum. There are often people wanting to know abut AD. Please pop in sometime.

Hey - I don't think that you want me to give my "honest opinion" on Dubai or Abu Dhabi! For real for real. I have had an experience and I dont want to be negative on such a public forum.But I will, if it will be helpful. I want to be positive. Which brings me to my next point. I'm more than concerned about moving to Greater London now, after reading the posts and reading other sites. It seems to me that there are not many people who actually like, really like, living there. I read more negative posts about the UK than positive ones. Between reading about the crime and the weather and the high prices, I get the impression that I don't want to move there, especially with my pre-teen as a single parent. What are some positive, uplifting things about Greater London that I can look forward to? I understand that I will be paying 1/3 or more of my salary in taxes; that I will be paying an exorbitant amount for utilities and all that. I pay nothing here in Abu Dhabi - but I'm leaving regardless. That means something. I certainly am not naive, being originally from the 5th largest city in the US, but certainly someone can offer some encouragement? Personally, every time I've visited London, including the time when I lived in Paris, I had nothing but a postive experience. Even when British Airways lost our luggage, when I went to London for my interviews and attended all of the interviews in a hoodie, sweats and Adidas. Even then, I had a good experience. Who can give me encouragement from the land of 1,000 rains? Best, PJ