looking for area to live near Barking/Dagenham in Essex

Hello! I am very excited as I have recently been offered a job as a substitute (supply) teacher through an agency in the UK. I will be working in the suburb of London called Barking and Dagenham (directly east of London), which, I believe, is technically in Essex. My  British boyfriend of 2 and a half years will probably be working in the Basildon or Benfleet area of Essex next year. He will have a car, but I will be relying on pubic transportation to get to work. I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions for areas to live that would be on the tube/bus/train line so I could easily get to Barking and Dagenham every day and he could drive to Basildon. We want somewhere we will feel safe and is easy for me to travel. He lives in England but does not know which areas would be best to live. If anyone lives in these areas or has any suggestions, I'd love to hear from you! Thanks!

Essex is a weird creature.  You technically would be working in the London Bough of Barking and Dagenham, but your address will probably say “Essex” in it somewhere.  I know mine does. 

My husband works in Upminster (LB Havering), and we’ve lived in Brentwood, Essex and Hornchurch, Havering.  Neither are far from Barking.  I’m sure someone will not be happy with my saying this, but the East End can be nice out in Zone 5-6, dodgy until the docks, and then it’s very nice and very expensive.  Barking station is on both the main line and the District line so getting into work by train shouldn’t be an issue for you.  The Hammersmith line also starts there if you’re going into London.  I would look somewhere along the East end of the District line so that you’re in the London travel zone.  If you lived someplace like Upminster or Hornchurch, your commute would be around 20 minutes station to station, and your husband would just zoom down the A127 into Baslidon, about a 30 minute commute. 

I prefer to live a bit further out, Hornchurch compared to Barking, because it feels nicer to me.  I have access to most things I could ask for, but live in a nicer area that feels safer than I think I would in Barking.  We looked at Upminster, and it’s nicer than Hornchurch, but housing was incredibly expensive.  We put that down to it being on the end of Zone 6 and train ticket prices jump after that, if you live into Essex.

Be careful relying on the District Line -- its one of those that are currently plagued by frequent suspension of service due to line improvements, and there's usually no service at all at the weekends for the same reason. I have a friend who commutes from his home in Upminster to South Kensington on the District and it's a headache.

An area with good access to Barking and Dagnenham is Ilford/Goodmayes. They are NOT very pretty....a bit rough, frankly, but there are pockets of "nice" family residential streets. I have a friend who lives there with her family and they seem very loyal to the area. There is a strong community feel there, even though, as I warn, it doesn't look very nice in the main drag streets. It too has Essex in the address but comes under some kind of London administration, as do many of the Essex border towns, which are also complete with London buses, rail and Tube stations despite being technically Essex.

Thank you both very much for writing back to me with suggestions! It's always good to hear opinions from people living in the area instead of blindly going to some place we found on a map that was between where we'd both be working. It's also good to know all that information about the tube lines so I don't try to rely on ones that might not work out for me. I'll pass the info about where to live to my boyfriend and we'll start looking into those places. Thank you both again so much! It was extremely helpful and I really appreciate it!

An area with good access to Barking and Dagnenham is Ilford/Goodmayes. They are NOT very pretty....a bit rough, frankly, but there are pockets of "nice" family residential streets.

Midnight, do you mind sharing what area of Ilford you live in?  I've been to Ilford before and you're right when you say it's not pretty.  Since I work in Central London we're always trying to get that bit closer, but with my husband working in Upminster we're doomed to the East end.  We've picked Hornchurch and Brentwood because they are nice.  Grocery stores within walking distance, neighbors that we speak to, nice high streets.  The couple of times I've been to Ilford it didn't feel like that to me.  But living in Ilford would make my commute easier and quicker. 

Rachel, the good things about Upminster is the main line station.  If the District line isn't working a train to Barking is 7-8 minutes.  Plus there is also the District line, or a bus (about 30 minutes).  According to tfl, Ilford is 22 minutes to Barking by walking and bus.  Goodmayes can be as little as 13 by bus.  http://www.tfl.gov.uk/  Since you aren't going far there are almost always several ways to get around. 

I've been commuting to London for a bit and have found that I can never rely soley on one way to go.  Something will always be cancelled, running late, or have works on it.  There have been two day bus strikes that have left me stranded, signal failures in the tube stations so I've needed to reroute, and vandalism of trains so they have to be cancelled and pulled out of service. The District line is a huge pain on the weekends, hell most of the tube is with all the upgrades!  This weekend there is part closure on the Bakerloo, District, Hammersmith & City, Jubilee, Metropolian, Piccadily, Victoria, and the entire Waterloo & City is closed!!  The entire tube is going through works and improvement, but I'm not sure of their target finish date or if it's rolling works that are always going on.  I get the mainline into Fenchurch Street or Liverpool Street.  It's much quicker and hardly ever are there works at the weekends.

You can wikipedia and upmystreet areas for crime rates, schools, and transportation. 
http://www.upmystreet.com/local/uk.html

Ilford and Goodmayes are in LB Redbridge: http://www.redbridge.gov.uk/
Upminster and Hornchurch are in LB Havering: http://www.havering.gov.uk/index.aspx?articleid=295
Barking is in LB B&D: http://www.barking-dagenham.gov.uk/

Hi Larissa; the area of Ilford where my friend lives is Goodmayes, close to the huge new Tesco's there. Goodmayes is kind of contiguous with Ilford and, like Ilford, is not very goodlooking! But families seem happy there; her family gets on very well with their neighbors and they seem to be very much a community. The area does have a rundown look and feel in the high streets, though the individual houses are modestly nice. My friend has a terraced house and it's very nicely remodelled, with a gorgeous kitchen opening out onto a courtyard back garden where they throw great parties -- there are lots of unexpectedly very nicefamily homes like that in this area even though it's depressing otherwise. These areas do have a feeling of being the "east end" even though the address is Essex -- they are kind of extensions of the east end in both geography and population.

As you work in central London and don't fancy the east end much, have you thought about Loughton? It is technically Essex, but it's got a central line tube that takes you directly into the heart of London in about forty minutes. It's north-east (ish) of the barking and Ilford area and tends to be where east end natives migrate outward to for more peaceful surroundings yet still have a tube line into the city.

I lived there for a few months and it's quite nice. I also found it friendly, which is not what I find too much now that I'm in the middle of London. Set in the middle of very pretty Epping Forest and rolling farmlands, there is Loughton proper, which has a mixture of rather posh homes and then middle class middle of the road homes; it has a great Sainsbury's with a large parking lot, right by Loughton tube station, and a very nice High Street.

Then nestling nearby is a kind of sub-division of Loughton called Debden. This is a more working class spot and not that pretty except for always a horizon view of again the beautiful meadows, farms and forest that surround the town. Debden is a little rougher round the edges, like Goodmayes and Ilford, but on the plus side I found the people very friendly. The shopkeepers along the Broadway are the salt of the earth and I still miss them!

Sorry, rambling off on tangents now, hahah! Hope any of this helps.

Controversial as it is, Google Streetview could give you a little look at the places themselves.

Midnight, thanks for replying.  I feel bad that you've written such a long reply.  We haven't looked at Loughton because it never suited our needs.  Upminster and Loughton are the same distance to my work.  Upminster is 22 minutes from Fenchurch Street by train, it's getting down to South London, where I work, that takes so long. 

My perfect place to live would be Epping, but realistically we need to live in Zone 2-3 on the East side in a place that isn't...scary.  We haven't found that yet.

Midnight, thanks for replying.  I feel bad that you've written such a long reply.  We haven't looked at Loughton because it never suited our needs.  Upminster and Loughton are the same distance to my work.  Upminster is 22 minutes from Fenchurch Street by train, it's getting down to South London, where I work, that takes so long. 

My perfect place to live would be Epping, but realistically we need to live in Zone 2-3 on the East side in a place that isn't...scary.  We haven't found that yet.

No worries, I'm sorry I rambled on a bit there, hahahh!

Epping is a lovely place -- but alas even further out than Loughton. It's two tube stops futher northeast of the Lougton area, and also very expensive. I remember actually looking in an estate agents window there, and everything seemed to be half a million and up. 

Hope you can figure out a place -- the good news is there's a lot to choose from in London as it's basically a collection of many "villages" almost, but all in one mass, and each neighborhood varies from the last in terms of feel, family-suitability and even price ranges - - best wishes for the search.