Where can you afford to rent?

We Are London

We're of the philosophy that repetition is the mother of all learning. So we're going to say it again: we live in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Just ask Savills, UBS, or indeed any housing, financial or reporting institution - they consistently rank London among the top ten most costly places to live.

Between 2015 and 2016 the already sky-high rents increased by almost 4%. Last month a spokesperson for Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, said that London's renters have been short-changed for far too long.

So where can you afford? Before you start the demoralising trawl through rightmove.co.uk, the Thrillist website compiled a handy London Underground map showing the average monthly price of a one bedroom flat along the tube stops.

To the surprise of absolutely no one the closer you get to the centre of town the pricier it gets. But there are some startling observations. According to their intel Hatton Cross, at the western end of the Piccadilly line, is just £324 a month, yet just one stop up the line at Hounslow West it more than doubles to £732. Another oddity is Upton Park where the average one bed is £692, sandwiched in between the more expensive Plaistow (£916) and East Ham (£960).

This of course doesn't include the areas that aren't served by the underground. There's the relatively bargainous Lewisham, which being one of those neighbourhoods on the rise probably won't be for very long. And then there's the eye-wateringly expensive Chelsea, which may be within walking distance of Fulham Broadway and South Ken, but given that the borough of Kensington & Chelsea suffers from the worst air pollution in the capital we're assuming everyone there drives.

The Mayor has vowed to build thousands of new affordable homes, and name and shame rogue landlords who charge rents that are tantamount to highway robbery providing low standards of housing in return. But in the short term we're still stuck with the crisis of not being able to afford decent living.

Tell us about your home-hunting perils. Do you live under Heathrow's flightpath because it's the only affordable option? Have you been forced to commute from Milton Keynes every day? Leave us a comment on Twitter, Google+ or Facebook.

Posted Date
Jul 21, 2016 in We Are London by We Are London