Propped up in bed one night and feeding her newborn daughter, Rosie Davies-Smith was idly scrolling on Rightmove.
She and her husband Nick had a long-cherished dream of living by the sea and Rosie just wanted to see what was out there.
“I searched for properties all along the south coast, all the way from Essex to Cornwall, that had water access,” she says.
A slightly ramshackle former B&B near Kingsbridge, Devon, popped up.
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Despite its shortcomings – every bedroom has a small, windowless en suite bathroom and there is very little in the way of entertaining space – the property ticked many boxes.
Most importantly the four-bedroom house was within the couple’s budget. It also has a big garden, and outbuildings.
“It is also on a tidal creek and for four hours, twice a day, we can get out to the sea,” says Rosie.
A week later the couple, both 37, went to view the house, quickly made an offer, and put their London home on the market.
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By November 2020 they had sold their three-bedroom Victorian house in St Johns, Lewisham, for £630,000, paid £835,000 for the farmhouse, and moved 240 miles west.
Pre-pandemic Rosie was running her own PR firm, PR Dispatch, based in Peckham, while Nick was the COO of a tech company.
“Moving out of London was something we had always discussed, but it was very much a five- or even ten-year pipeline dream,” says Rosie.
When the pandemic hit the couple had begun working from home, and they simply carried on from Devon.
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Their first child, Sloane, is now four, and when Rosie pressed “enter” on that fateful Rightmove search she had just found out she was expecting Isla, who is now three.
There are naturally things about London which Rosie misses – the great food, the convenience of being able to call an Uber when she wants to go somewhere rather than booking a minicab “three weeks in advance”.
And she also wishes the girls were growing up with more access to culture and multiculturalism.
“I am making a concerted effort to take them up to London regularly so that they get some of those things in their life,” she says.
Many Londoners considering an exit are worried about leaving behind family and friends and before they moved, Rosie and Nick didn’t know a soul in Devon.
Over the past four years Rosie has been pleasantly surprised by how many like-minded friends – mainly women with young children who, like her, used to live in London – she has found there.
“I have made a really great group of friends, who are like family really, and everything is so easy because we all live in close proximity,” she says.
