sharonranae

I am planning a 2-3 month visit to England in 2015. While staying in England I'd like to let a furnished flat. I am unfamiliar with England on a whole and am not sure which areas would be cost friendly to do so. Ideally I'd like to pre-pay for my lodging before arriving in country. Is it realistic to (and if so where) expect to pay £500 for such accomodations? If not what is a realistic rental price per month? In which regions should I be looking? [and] How does one go about finding comfortable lodging from across the pond?

Ackislander

The cheapest places are going to be beyond commuting range of London ( roughly 1-1.5 hours).

They are going to be rooms, perhaps with shared bath and kitchen, in private houses.

You will almost certainly have to pay cash.

You do not need to limit yourself to a single location; in fact, I would recommend against it.

Decide on what parts of England you want to see, and base yourself in a principal town or small city where you will have access to public transportation and supermarkets. After a week or two, move on to another. University towns when the university is not in session might be a good bet, and some have inexpensive accommodation in residence halls.

nytraveler

500 pounds per month for a flat? You need to define what you want.

If you mean London - NO - it's not possible - it's not even close. It wouldn't even cover a week.

If you mean some rural area (not sure they would have flats) someone local would have to provide information. I can't imagine that would be a price in any area near tourist attractions. Are you looking to retire to the deep country for hiking and getting away from the world?

bilboburgler

Rightmove is a good website to get an overview for the whole country on this

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/York.html

Nichael1963

£500 is not going to get you much in London; you need to think a bit about where you want to go. Its cheaper for accommodation up north than down south in London so i think you need to do your home work, i would imagine London is where you want to go http://homes.trovit.co.uk/for-rent-f...r-month-london this might help if you are thinking of staying in a hotel while you try and get a flat. http://www.chilloutguide.co.uk/locat...odation-guide/
Good luck.

sharonranae

I actually do not want to be in London. I am hoping to find a seaside or countryside town with train and buses. As I said in my original post, I am unfamiliar with England on a whole. I understand that the cost of living is much less in the north. If £500 is not realistic it is quite understandable, I'm simply trying get a good idea on what my travels will cost so I can start planning accordingly.

nytraveler

You still need to define what you want to do.

Are you looking in a small seaside village or country town that may be a couple of buses and an hour or more to something to see or do? If you are looking for sightseeing - even quaint villages - I don't think that price is going to do it -but I'm not an expert.

I would try the websites above - but would not be surprised if all you can find is a room in someone's house at the end of hell and gone.

Gordon_R

OK if outside the London area, £500pcm won't be a problem for a small 1 bed flat or studio.

A bigger problem is that most landlords are unwilling to lease out a property for just 2-3 months - it's just too much fuss having to re-advertise again and disruptive to lose the regular rental income. Having said that you might find someone with a vacant property on their hands who is getting desperate, or there's the sort of places catering for business people (probably higher than your budget though).

MmePerdu

Even if the listings don't specifically say so, accommodations on https://www.airbnb.com are often available for a longer term rental. If you see one (or more) you like, you can send an inquiry to ask the owner. Monthly rentals are billed to your credit card in your own currency once a month on rentals over 4 weeks.

The procedure would be for owners to make you a "special offer" through the site and when you both accept the terms, it's done. You're very likely to get a similar place for less, often much less, than by going through commercial agencies, as you're dealing directly with the owner, the website simply handles the transaction. No cash required, in your currency so no exchange fees. I've used the site and had very good experiences.

hetismij2

If you are planning for outside the summer months then many holiday lets can be rented for a longer period for a good rate.
I think you should have a look online at tourist information on the UK and decide where you would like to be, at least in a vague way, then search for holiday lets in that area, and contact the owners or agents to see if you can do a long term rental.
Check what is included in the rent too, gas, electricity, TV licence, etc, also if there is no washing machine whether there is a launderette nearby.

Mimar

MmePerdu << No cash required, in your currency so no exchange fees >>

I don't understand this. The owner would be getting paid in GBP, the renter paying in their own currency. Somewhere the conversion must be made. At what rate?

MmePerdu

We pay in our own currency by credit card, we're quoted in US dollars when we use the site and book. Yes, they're paid, obviously in their own currency, but there's no additional fee tacked on to our booking for the exchange. What we see, plus the Airbnb fee also shown, is what we pay. That's what I know.

If knowing the rate and where it's applied is important to you, then pursue it for us. I just want to know what my price is when I book and I do when I use the site. I suspect it's rounded up in the conversion but part of the nice thing about using them is the ease of payment and not messing about with deposits and balances and the like, as I've done with cash transactions or wiring payment. If there's a small charge for conversion it's unnoticeable and easy and that's worth a great deal to me.

MmePerdu

Mimar, it occurs to me that when we use a credit card, in general, with no foreign transaction fee, such as Capital One, we get a better deal than if we use a card that uses their conversion rate plus an additional foreign transaction fee. Maybe the conversion, using Airbnb, is a similar situation. They use the bank rate, hypothetically, but no additional conversion fee or ATM transaction fee, which there would be taking one's own money out at an ATM to make a payment in cash. In any case, it would be interesting to know. But not interesting enough to me to find out. I wish you would, though, and tell us. I just know it's painless.

flanneruk

It's just as important to understand what you actually want to do.

The only two places from which it's really possible to travel easily to a substantial part of England without incurring substantial further overnight accommodation costs are London (which you've ruled out) and Birmingham (which common sense rules out).

No seaside town has adequate transport links to most of the rest of England enabling same-day return travel, except of course to its own catchment. A cheap resort in SE England (like Ramsgate) is fine (in its way) for going into London but useless for anywhere else: Whitby's fine for Durham, but hopeless for Stratford or the Pennines.

Locking yourself away in a small English town or village is a terrific way of completing the novel or using walking therapy to get over a failed affair - and some small villages, with a car, make good bases for seeing bits of England. But you're going to have to be very, very selective about which bits if you're relying on public transport.