Moving back to the UK in April - House and car finding advice

So, hubby has scored a transfer from Melbourne to London with his current employer. Happily his employer is taking care of most things but I would be grateful if anyone could give some tips/advice on the following:

> We're going to have to rent as we still have our Aussie home (plan is to return to Aus once our eldest is due to start primary school) - we've had a look on Rightmove and Zoopla, are there any other resources we should know about?

> Been looking around Hitchin/Letchworth Garden City/Royston/Cambridge for places to live - are these areas ok/not ok for a family with pre-school kids? Hubby needs to be on the Kings Cross/St Pancras line and we'd like to be close to Cambridge as his sister lives near there. We're from near Manchester originally so haven't got a clue about the SE.

> Finding a car - Autotrader? Anything similar?

> I understand 3 year olds are able to access 15 hours a week of free pre-school/kindy; in reality are we going to be able to get that? Where we are in Melbourne you have to put them down for 4yo kinder when they're about 18mo to have a hope of getting a spot :-(

TIA for your help xxx

I'm afraid I don't have anything more to add as to where you can look for houses or cars, other than to suggest Googling for location specific results. But I wanted to reply anyway so that at least someone has replied to you.

I think you're looking at the right housing resources

All of those areas are pretty good for families with kids (for context, I was born in Sheffield but family moved south, to Royston, when I was a baby and then I grew up there and in Cambridge, then years later moved back and lived there again in my 30s for another 5 years and nearby for another 5 before coming out here).

Cambridge is expensive and the traffic there is very ordinary . But on the flipside it has an awful lot of everything else going for it - shops, pubs, restaurants, architecture, things to see and do, lots of businesses/jobs/science park etc and it has a really nice atmosphere whereas the others are much smaller towns with mostly local services but most people commuting for work

The train service down that line is very good. Frequent and reliable. Fastest trains from Cambridge do it in 45 mins but in peak hour they don't run the non-stop so it's an hour. Closer in, Royston is about 50 mins, Letchworth 40-45, Hitchin 30-35. Hitchin has the best service because it gets trains on both the Cambridge branch and the Huntingdon one. On which subject looking up that line is also possible. Biggleswade is a bit grotty, Sandy and St Neots nicer, Huntingdon/Godmanchester also OK and <60 mins to London. Parking at any station around here is going to cost so bear that in mind, if you've a walk or cycle or something to the train station it does without the need to run 2 cars and saves a lot in parking and running costs.

Having said that, if you don't like the towns then there are any number of nice villages around them in that area, they're all quite nice and a handful of them have stations too with a direct London service

Preschools weren't *that* competitive when I lived back there, but this may have changed. The 15 hours free is just a government rebate, administered by the preschools. Almost exactly like how childcare rebate works here. At a wild guess I would expect childcare to also be more expensive and under more pressure in Cambridge as it's the local "big" city and there are a lot of families there where both parents will be working

As for cars, again you are on the right lines. Autotrader is the default resource. If you do end up living somewhere that you need 2 cars and one is going to be a "station" car that does virtually nothing except go to the station then I'd say just get an <$1000 old banger. Ebay also worth looking at