What are some good suburbs in/near London?

In addition to the twenty miles issue, roads are twisty so 20 miles can take 45 minutes or more.

Wow! I never thought of this...

We didn't mean to sound bossy -- it's just they've gotten really, really heavy about the rules in recent years. It's generally worth giving a noob a good shake  

It's interesting to fly over London at night. It's nothing like flying over a US city, all lit up in nice, neat gridlines. London is circular islands of light connected by meandering ribbons. That's the utter lack of gridding plus dark areas that are parkland.

Not to lead you astray -- there are parts of London I find grubby and depressing. But you'll be apartment shopping in person, so you'll be able to check it out.

We live in the country now, surrounded by sheep. Love it.

Very good to know. I'm sure his company has the visa worked out. We're going to take a long time to get there, look at flats, move in, settle, etc. etc. and then we (or maybe just he, not sure yet) will be coming back to the US. I'm sure that by then the company will have it totally covered.

Have you lived together for at least 2 years? If you have, he might be eligible for an unmarried partner visa, which could definitely be obtained before September and it would give him the ability to work.

We have not lived together for a full two years.


Just to sort of hijack the thread away from the visa topic:
I hope nobody takes my ignorance on the matter of the visa issue as a sign that he doesn't have it 100% covered. It's not that there is any confusion regarding his visa... I have just never bothered to ask about it, since I don't need one, and I know he's never had any trouble with it before, and he'd tell me if there was any problem with it. His company sends him to lots of countries on business, and they always take care of the visa smoothly and quickly.
I'm just tagging along with him on this adventure, not vice versa.   
He and his company have got it covered. I guarantee!!

   Tell me about it.  I always think ohhh 15 miles, wait 40 mins to go 15 miles!  Ahh!

Just to sort of hijack the thread away from the visa topic:
I hope nobody takes my ignorance on the matter of the visa issue as a sign that he doesn't have it 100% covered. It's not that there is any confusion regarding his visa... I have just never bothered to ask about it, since I don't need one, and I know he's never had any trouble with it before, and he'd tell me if there was any problem with it. His company sends him to lots of countries on business, and they always take care of the visa smoothly and quickly.
I'm just tagging along with him on this adventure, not vice versa.   
He and his company have got it covered. I guarantee!!

No problem - as long as it's all sorted, that's great .

It just sounded like he might start working/being paid for the job when he is a visitor and before he has the visa, which is illegal ... so we all just wanted to make sure you're both aware of that so he doesn't end up in any kind of trouble with UK immigration in the future (you'd be surprised how many people think they can just move to the UK and start working without going through all the red tape and immigration/visa stuff first).

Thanks for the tip. I'll make sure that he knows that. I know he was over to London on a work visa about four years ago, but only for a short time.

That's wild about the short distance taking so long. I guess when I'm driving 85 mph on a ten-lane freeway, the miles whiz by in the blink of an eye. On google streetview (pretty much our only option to explore until we get there) the roads all just have one lane each way, and they do snake a little from what I see. To top that, we won't even have a car, and public transit always seems to take 125% as long as driving our own car would, for the same start and end points.

Oh well, it's just something we'll have to factor in. Now whenever we search for a flat (we've focused our search to south and southeast London area) we make sure to check it out on street view and then get public transit estimates from there until central London. We're aiming for like under 40 minutes.

The search is going pretty well, actually. Basically after we check that we like the flat and the neighborhood from photos alone, that it's in the budget we've been given, and that the commute is livable, we then put it on our list of places to check out if they're still available in September! We have about five prospects right now, and we keep on looking every day. I've also contacted a few of my cousins (Scotland and Ireland, but they're familiar with London) and they've given me some great advice. The best tip was from this forum though!

South of the river, for our budget and commute.

Gosh, unless places say they aren't available until September, I'd be pretty surprised if any of your prospects are still available in two months. But it's still good to check things out.

Gosh, unless places say they aren't available until September, I'd be pretty surprised if any of your prospects are still available in two months. But it's still good to check things out.

My bf tells me this all the time, but I'm HOOKED on rightmove.co.uk

Thanks for the tip. I'll make sure that he knows that. I know he was over to London on a work visa about four years ago, but only for a short time.

There are different kinds of visas for different activities and also the types of work visa changed in 2008 (they're also much more difficult to get now as well).

If he was only in the UK for a short period of time, he probably came to the UK on a business visitor visa... which is just for people coming to do short-term business activities in the UK, while still maintaining their regular employment in the US... for example, attending conference and important meetings, or arranging business deals, just over a few days.

If he wants to work in the UK more long-term he will either need a Tier 2 Sponsored work visa (sponsorship by a UK company) or a Tier 2 Intra-Company Transfer visa (transferring to a UK branch of his US company)... and to get one of those visas, he needs to score a certain number of points based on salary (you need to be earning a minimum amount in the UK to qualify), maintenance funds and a Certificate of Sponsorship from his employer.

That's wild about the short distance taking so long. I guess when I'm driving 85 mph on a ten-lane freeway, the miles whiz by in the blink of an eye. On google streetview (pretty much our only option to explore until we get there) the roads all just have one lane each way, and they do snake a little from what I see. To top that, we won't even have a car, and public transit always seems to take 125% as long as driving our own car would, for the same start and end points.

In London, I would imagine that driving a car could take even longer than using public transport, at least in Central London anyway, plus you have to pay a £10 per day (Mon-Fri) congestion charge just to drive into certain central areas of the city! I don't think I would try to own a car in London if I lived there - I'd probably be too nervous with all the congestion (think driving in Manhattan but with smaller, twisty roads instead of straight and wide NY roads - the average speed of cars in Central London is only about 7 mph) .

I can't stress enough that I'm really really really not worried at all about the visa. I talked to him yesterday, and he said he's taking care of it all with his company. The reason I seem so clueless is because there is nothing for me to worry about. If there was any reason to think there would be any problem or delay in his visa, which he hopes to obtain by the new year, then I would probably be all over it. As smoothly as he tells me it's going (as his company is very international and sends people all over the place all the time) then I'm not even really thinking about it.

About the car, yes I can imagine a car taking even longer than transit! I have heard the traffic gets outrageous.

Just ignore all our our talk about visas.  We just like talking about them. 

Just ignore all our our talk about visas.  We just like talking about them. 

hahahaha... I can tell. Thank goodness I don't need one. I feel sort of odd when people ask me and I say "I'm a citizen over there, in the UK," and then it sounds rather contradictory when I fess up that I've never been to England. My family is from Northern Ireland, so of course I am a UK citizen, but I've literally never set foot in England at all! It's so strange. With my three citizenships (US, Ireland, and UK) I've never had to worry about a visa in my life, to be honest.
Andy (my man) has his all sorted out in the proper process though. I just don't ask about it because we talk over skype. His internet goes out quite often, so we spend the only time we have gushing over flats that will probably not still be there when we arrive... although, we're more interested in finding neighborhoods and learning about what areas to focus on. The individual flats themselves are less important to us than the area we will be living in.

You'll have a really great time when you can actually get to the UK and look at neighborhoods.  I found that was the best way for us to make a decision.  Basically we started at my office address and looked from there. 

Hi maevemoonbeam,

Just wanted to put my two cents in as I've been a resident of SE London for the past five years:

If you don't like big cities, avoid Stockwell, Brixton, Peckham and New Cross.  Pockets of Oval and Kennington are OK (around Albert Square and Cleaver Square).  Dulwich Village is lovely and some parts of West & East Dulwich are nice too (East - less nice as you move towards Peckham).  I find Camberwell dodgy and bad for transport -- though it does have some great restaurants.  Elephant and Castle is supposed to be up and coming but it is noisy, dirty and I'd be scared to walk alone there at night.  Honor Oak Park -- the streets close to the station are pretty good.  The trains from there to central London are fast and a great deal nicer than the tube. 

Phew! That's all I can think of at the moment.

I hope that is helpful.  Best of luck to you! 

About the car, yes I can imagine a car taking even longer than transit! I have heard the traffic gets outrageous.

This, absolutely in central London.

I take the bus and Tube from home to work, and the tube portion of my journey takes about 30-40 minutes.  The bus is about another 15-20 minutes.  So, maybe about an hour to get to work each day.

Once when there was a fire emergency in one of the stations, my line wasn't running.  I took the bus the whole way, and it took about 2.5 hours to get to work.  And it wasn't due to the bus making frequent stops - it was due to just sitting in traffic and moving one inch (if that) every 15 minutes or so.  It seems the traffic lights only let through one car at a time.

Oh, I'd HATE to drive in London. All over the city, there are various devices in the road they call "traffic calming measures" -- things like road humps and places where they deliberately narrow the roads to make you slow to a crawl.

Yep. That's right. They deliberately do things to slow down traffic in London.

I know you've been looking at southeast London, I'd like to throw southwest London into the ring. If you want some really lovely areas, you can't go wrong with the areas around Richmond, Kingston and Wimbledon. Big open spaces (Richmond Park and Wimbledon Common). The Thames is right there which makes for lovely leisure activities and riverside pubs. Surbiton which is one the suburbs of Kingston, is a really lovely area. There's also Teddington, Hampton Wick and Strawberry Hill (the names alone are enticing)! They are leafy and green and yes, doesn't have the direct links to London Bridge that the southeast has, but it definitely gives you the advantages of living in London without having to live in London.

I lived in North Sheen for a while (£825/month for a 2bd) and although I was on a major road, it was fantastic being so close to the villages of Richmond and Kew. Although, if you do decide to take a look at southwest London - watch out for the Heathrow flight path!