Calling all Bristolians...Moving to Bristol & I need advice

[whatnow]

hey, thanks for reading my plea for help, lol.

My housemates and I are all getting kicked out of our house in 3 months time and we're all planning on going to bristol. We chose Bristol becuase we're all into our media related jobs and bristol seems to be like a great place to go for all aspects of media related work (obviously london is better but we're all really keen on bristol instead). in my house we have a journalist/writer, a film producer/sound designer/director and multimedia/computer 'artists' (if that helps!).

I was hoping people who live there could help us (or just people with knowledge/advice on the place). We don't really know where we want to live or where we should live if we wanted to be close to the good areas.

From what I've found out Clifton seems to be a really nice place to live. It may be expensive but that's less of an issue becuase we're all gonna be working. However to be realistic we're not all going to land into perfect jobs so the best of the best is probably out of the question, but i'm open to all suggestions! We all share all of the outgoing costs in our house so becuase of that we can afford to spend a bit more cash on renting/living becuase we do so well out of sharing the cost.

There are a lot of area's that from looking at letting agent's don't look too great. We don't exactly live in the best area at the moment, but it doesn't bother us. We're all up for good communities and stuff like that but are not really prepared to pay less to be living in an area where we could be at risk or anything like that. We're professionals lol.

Anyway, i've looked in the usual places like upmystreet.com, letting agetns websites and websites about the city but I can't find any unbiased info on the actual areas to live in. Also if anyone has any good recommendations on what area's would have a lot of work for media related jobs then that would be a massive karma filled bonus. I know I can look at where jobs are and plot out maps, and I have been, but it's never as good as real accounts from the people who live there.

Thanks so much in advance, every day I leave this and every day I just get more worried about the fact that we've all got to move soon and have nowhere to go.

[lin]

If you're renting have you tried places like this to see what kind of things are out there?

http://www.ukpropertyshop.co.uk/s/Br..._Clifton.shtml

[whatnow]

thanks for replying lin, I appreciate it

I've looked over that site so many times trying to find a decent letting agent and a house in a good area. The problem is that the site has so many letting agents in there it takes hours to go through it, and i've been doing it nearly every week for a month or two. It makes me want to design a site that can read all the other sites and make one big database of all the lettings/houses for sale.

edit: Actually i am really grateful, I have only looked over the whole of bristol and this is area specific, thank you very much

sometimes moving house can be fun but other times it can be a total nightmare deciding what's best :\

[lin]

Not a problem, I got that page from this site:

http://www.ukpropertyshop.co.uk/s/le..._Bristol.shtml

[whatnow]

yeah i had been using that site but i just didn't know it broke it down into areas for the city.

If anyone else has any tipc or advice for where to live i'd really appreaite it, otherwise it looks like we'll be moving to clifton, lol.

on a side note does anyone know where to download big OS style maps of cities? I was going to make a montage from multimap but if I can do better i'd love to know.

Sorry for all the requests:|

[lin]

http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.sr...stol,+Bristol+[City/Large+Town]&searchp=newsearch.srf&mapp=newmap.srf


This is handy but probably not detailed enough for you. If I can find anything else for you I'll let you know.
Meanwhile, "Cold Fear" on the xbox calls.

[whatnow]

thank you again lin, most helpful, go and enjoy Cold Fear

I am montaging bristol up from multimap as I speak...god its boring

[Bagpus]

Hi shangrula,

I have moved a lot of people in and around Bristol. Clifton I must say would be my choice (for quality), The bulk of properties are old, but in the main the area and properties are well kept. What apart from work are you looking for?

The Clifton area is pref to most other parts of Bristol and is quite close to the centre. Without the rough element which most of the other areas close to the centre have.

Obviously the closer to the centre you are the closer to work in the city, but dont you drive?

There is an alternative there are studio's, TV & Radio work, design, computer work, local airport etc in and around the Patchway Area (Bradley Stoke etc)it's about 5 to 6 miles from the centre just off the M5 but also a reasonable area to live.

I dont live in Bristol myself, I'm around 25 miles away, but I work there and know people who live there.

Regards

[Imran]

My friend lived in Bradley Stoke, looked like a great area to live in, with a lot of decent brand new houses coming up very cheap on the market.

Im

[whatnow]

bagpus & imran, thanks for your responses.

Not 100% sure on the type of work I am after, that's one of my problems! it will involve computers but i've got a fairly side range of basic skills but i've got a degree in interactive multimedia so perhaps i'll relate it to that, i dunot know i'm a typical graudate

clifton and bradley stoke do sound good places to go. I've robbed half a map from multimap so far (it's taking so long to copy and paste all the segments at nearly street level, I wish I wasn't a skank and just got a OS map!

bagpus, are you a letting agent or something? We're keen to rent or possibly purchase in 6+ months too, I was wondering if you know good info on the bristol propety market you wouldn't mind sharing I've nearly brought proerty before (including the hous eI live in now) but never comited to anything becuase the local market (in stoke) seemed to peak in the last 12 months after nearly doubling in 2 years...crazy.

[Bagpus]

bagpus, are you a letting agent or something?

:nono

Run a removals & storage company, if you find the place give me a buzz!:thumbs

Very competitive!!!

Lots of manual, sales etc work around in Patchway (large industrial and retail market) just as a gap filler etc...

[chubblies]

Ag good ole Bristol, lived there for 4 years! Clifton is a very nice area, but VERY expensive-I used to live in Cliftonwood, which is a stones throw away from Clifton, but a lot cheaper. Also Hotwells is a nice area, again close to Clifton but way cheaper.
Most of Bristol is pretty good though, avoid areas like Stokescroft, Eastville, St pauls, Easton, Knowle west, as they are the rougher areas...Anywhere that is close to Whiteladies rd is good to live, and great for night life, food etc, but anywhere near Clifton is also full of students, so bear that in mind if you like a quiet life!

EDIT: if you are looking to rent, try "property concepts", could not find em on google, but directory enq will have them-they are based in Clifton and rent around that area, I used to be with them and they were really good agents

[whatnow]

thanks chubblies, another really helpful reply

I am really grateful for the list of bad areas. I was aware of st. pauls being a dive but knew there would be more.

Still very keen on moving to clifton but it all depends on what we can sort out and if we can all get good jobs to pay the exxxxtortionate renting rates there (£100/Week...eek!) but I bet the houses there are all big old georgian beasts so u get what u pay for I guess My sister even used to live on Whiteladies Road, nearly everyone that's told me stuff about bristol told me about that road, it must be pretty good (even think I went drinking there when I was 14, but I was too young to remember now, just looked trendy/expensive)

Also more than up for living near students! We're all a bit too loud (we have 5 or so guitars and 3 amps, plus all the other general music/noises we make) living near students is OK becuase we can just pass ourselves off as them still...maybe not pay council tax for another year :O

Will look into property concepts too, thanks for them. Hopefully I can managed to get a good deal off someone, i'll just complain about the hosue and ask to pay less rent (always worth a go)

[chubblies]

No problem, our house consisted of 4 lads sharing and cost £1700 pcm, so £100pw is well cheeeep
Stay away from Anthony James & co lettings, as we got stung big time when we were in our 1st house with them as landlords, for "cleaning and repairs", even though the house was spotless, and we had looked after the house throughout:annoyed: