Relocating to Southern Manchester with family and dog?

Question

I am currently discussing with prospective employer a possibility of a full-time job in Manchester. I am a mother of three lovely kids and would like to bring them along with my husband. How much must I allocate for the cost of living like groceries, PUB and schooling? I also have a golden retriever, how much is a weekly cost of a big dog including vet and dog food. Any place you can recommend in Southern Manchester convenient and nice to live for a family like ours.

Answer 1

Well Manchester is pretty cheap for most things if you know where to go and are sensible. Although South Manchester is nice in some areas I'd say take a trip to North Manchester especially the Prestwich area which is a lovely safe area if you have children-it's only a few miles away from City Centre and has lots of parks (including the biggest municiple one in Europe-Heaton park).

Answer 2

Let me list a few places first of all, and then I will explain further.

Fallowfield, Withington, Didsbury, Chorlton, Northenden and Burnage. They are the main areas in south Manchester.

Out of those areas, the nicest (but also most expensive) is Didsbury. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Didsbury Didsbury is made up of numerous sub-areas, such as West Didsbury, East Didsbury, Didsbury Village and Didsbury Point (a newly invented area to try and sell houses for a higher price).

The area is deemed the 'nice' bit of Manchester, and is where many famous people have lived over the years (including Richard and Judy and Chris Evans) and has some very good schools, about 3 good parks and brilliant transport (trains run every half an hour to the airport and city centre, and the buses to the city are every few minutes). Didsbury Village (which isn't really a village- it's a suburb) is full of bars, restaurants and take away places.

Withington is cheaper than Didsbury, but a bit rougher. There are some nice bits, but the village centre is quite calm in comparrison to Didsbury's.

Chorlton has developed quite a lot in the last ten years, and is quite a lively place now, although it too can be quite rough at times.

Northernden is a dive- avoid it.

Burnage is the same- it's pretty rough

Fallowfield is studentsville, and rough too.

So, I say Didsbury (but then I am from there, so naturally biased). There is a 24 hour Tesco near the train station, plenty of pubs, lots of good primary schools, and lots of parks for your dog (although you have to pick up its p**p, or you will be fined). I can't tell you how much a dog costs, but get insurance if you think it'll be expensive. Generally, if I take my cat to the vet, it costs £25 to just be seen.

Answer 3

I can recommend chorlton-***-Hardy where I live, only problem is that house prices may be a bit high, but there are good junior schools in the area, its become a very cafe society sort of place, lots going on, cost of groceries is the same as everywhere else, there is a Morrisons supermarket and another supermarket, plus Unicorn which is a large organic store, Didsbury is also quite nice too, no idea about the dog as we don't have one.