Commuters, welcome to the West Country (just). Eleanor Doughty explores the best places to buy a house between one and two hours from London in Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Somerset It has long been said that west is best — and, with increasingly flexible working provisions, going way out west no longer means stopping at Charlbury, Oxfordshire. Welcome to the West.
‘There is a perspective that the north Cotswolds is an easier commute to London, but we’re not bad out here in south Gloucestershire,’ says Sebastian Hipwood, co-founder of Blue Book Agency. Even if the rail fares can be more expensive, he adds, ‘many of our buyers are willing to take that on the chin on the basis that you are in a beautiful part of the Cotswolds, getting better value for money than being closer to London.’ This is part three of a series of articles looking at the new commuter hotspots.
The previous two articles can be found here (north) and here (south) The opening up of life beyond Charlbury brings into focus long-term second-home favourite Moreton-in-Marsh and the surrounding villages of Great Wolford, Paxford and Little Compton, all of which, says Harry Gladwin, partner at The Buying Solution, are ‘extremely sought after by those who don’t need to be in London every day’. Mr Hipwood hails from Badminton near Chipping Sodbury, Gloucestershire, where he lives on the Duke of Beaufort’s estate. Badminton, he says, is a ‘slice of heaven — there’s something about it that g.
