It’s no secret Stroud is an appealing place to live. With stunning natural beauty, transport links and good schools, our town’s evergreen appeal has attracted curious newcomers for decades.
In recent years demand has hit the national press, with The Sunday Times famously christened Stroud the UK’s best place to live in 2019. This limelight may be contributing to the rising house prices in the area, which some locals say is tarnishing their dream of home ownership.
Take The Times’ recent headline crowning Stroud “chichi” and “the new neighbourhood to know.” The author reassures us “property in the town and surrounding villages is cheap”. That claim may make surprising reading for buyers from the area, who face average property prices of over £310,000, a nearly 41% increase in the past 5 years.
Stroud has been described as the “covent gardens of the Costwolds” by glossy magazines fawning over the coffee shops, vintage boutiques and galleries. This rose-tinted view of life in the five valleys has clearly caught on, as house prices in Stroud went up by 13% over the pandemic alone.
While ONS statistics show the pandemic gold rush has calmed down, we’re still regularly topping lists of popular spots for ‘London leavers’. Why are more people fleeing the big smoke for the Cotswold hills, and what impact is this having?
‘The thing that seems unfair is they’ve had a bigger income elsewhere’, say those struggling to buy in Stroud
Louise* is a local mum of young children working at a nearby school. Having grown up in Stroud, she’s rented in Rodborough for the past 9 years with her young family. Now they’re looking to buy their first property, but realised staying in Rodborough just isn’t a financial possibility for them.
“We’re in a really lucky position, and we’ve inherited some money, but we basically can’t afford to buy anything in this immediate area, so we’re looking [at the] top of town area now. Basically move out of Roborough, [which means] a change of school for the children. But it’s not really that surprising, because house prices are particularly high around here.”
“Most of my child’s class at school were people who have moved here in the last few years”
Louise explains that Rodborough has always been popular, but Covid had a dramatic impact. “I know a lot of people who were living in the centre of a city like Bristol or London during the pandemic, they really wanted that outdoor space. And they realised that if they could sell their flat in London, they could get a really big house here. Most of my child’s class at school were people who have moved here in the last few years.”
“They realized that they could work from home on their computers, so they were like, well, why can’t we do that somewhere else? I know quite a lot of people who work in London once or twice a week, it’s really easy for them to just get the train.”
“The thing that seems unfair sometimes is that they’ve had a bigger income elsewhere than the incomes that you can have around here. But I’ve got friends who’ve worked from 18 in really, really hard trades or whatever, and then they’ve had no chance of buying a house here. Some people really struggle to rent even, so they’ve had to go elsewhere.”
‘We’ve been really happy since we’ve been here’: Why are Londoners making the leap?
But what about those moving into the area, keen to get a breath of fresh air and settle down after years of London smog? Louise says that while it’s been disappointing having to leave Rodborough and for her children to move schools, she doesn’t have any ill-will toward new arrivals: “obviously, people moving in, a lot of them are now my friends.”
Diverse families from across the country have made the move to Stroud in recent years, whether for work or recreation. Many are attracted to the independent community-minded ethos, and eager to contribute to it.
Retired senior civil servant Gwyn traded in Kentish Town for Rodborough’s rolling hills in 2022. Back in London, he led teams of hundreds of people working to protect the UK from infectious diseases – a very unprecedented 2020 forced him to delaying retirement for 2 years to support his team. Afterwards, Gwyn and his wife were taking stock and looking for a change of scene.
“After COVID, we just wanted to get out. It wasn’t the London we’d fallen in love with.”
“I think there was something with COVID. Friends moved away,” he tells me. “All the things that we enjoyed doing, going to gigs, theater, all that, just stopped. After COVID, we just wanted to get out. It wasn’t the London that we’d fallen in love with.”
After their adult daughter moved to Bristol, Gwyn says they started looking to relocate closer to her. “I think we had friends for a drink. And [they said] ‘Have you seen the Times article?’ Which we hadn’t, but he really described it to us. So that was the first time I think we’d heard of Stroud.”
“It’s really joyful and nice, and everybody seemed really friendly”
One “very drizzly, cold December night” the pair caught the train up for the evening. “We walked into town the first time, and it was the Goodwill evening which blew us away, really. The whole community comes out, and it’s really joyful and nice, and everybody seemed really friendly.”
“We went to the Ale House. In London, you don’t make eye contact. You don’t speak to someone on the tube or in the pub. [But] we ended up talking to half the pub! Some of them were Stroud lifers, and they were all telling us how brilliant it was, with tips about where we should look.” On their next trip, after a walk on the Common and a crisp pint at the Albert, the pair set their sights on Rodborough.
Gwyn says the picturesque landscape potted with old mills reminds him of his upbringing in North Wales, a post-industrial outpost nestled in beautiful mountains. “We’ve been really happy since we’ve been here. It’s great.”
“It probably does affect house prices, but we also have a positive impact.”
Since the move, Gwyn says he and his wife have enjoyed getting stuck-in with the local community. “I’m in the Remembering Rodborough history group, so I’m [heavily involved in] the work on the allotment history. I’m on the allotment committee, I cycle with two different cycling clubs. And I’ve been playing pickleball with a load of pals.”
Gwyn says he understands the frustration that can be felt when people move to an area and “don’t give back or be part of the community”, giving the example of some British retirees in Spain. “I just think there’s people like us coming from London, and it probably does affect house prices, but we also have a positive impact. My wife’s not retired, but I am. It means I’ve got time to do stuff and experiences that might be useful.”
‘Stroud is my home’, say those priced out of the Cotswolds
Still, the growing pains of Stroud’s popularity can generate understandably painful feelings for those who feel left behind. Nia* has lived in Stroud for 30 years, moving with her young daughter from South Africa in the early 1990s and renting in several properties in the area.
Then in 2022, she was slapped with a Section 21 eviction notice by her landlord while studying for her degree. “I was in a long-term property for about nine years, and he gave me one month’s notice in the middle of my dissertation, and I was absolutely stuck.”
Facing a post-pandemic housing market, Nia says she was unable to find somewhere to rent or buy on her low income. So she’s made the difficult choice to move away to Pembrokeshire in South Wales. Nia worries about a growing divide in Stroud between people working locally who can’t afford a permanent home, and those moving in who can buy property.
“I don’t begrudge anybody”, she explains. “I’ve moved into a small Welsh community and taken [the house] off somebody else. So it’s not nimbyism, I just wish that the fact that you’d been living somewhere for a long time mattered, and that having a good tenancy record mattered, when you apply for a mortgage.”
“We’ve lost our roots.”
Nia says she feels cut off from the community she and her daughter had built in Stroud over decades. “That’s the great sadness for me. Because in order to feel at home, you have to have the people around you that care about you, that have known you for a long time. That is never going to happen [in Wales], because I’m too old to make ‘old friends’. I’m on the periphery of an established community, and in Stroud I wasn’t on the periphery. I was inside it because it was my home.”
Nia tells me about those little things that made Stroud feel hers; knowing the shortcuts, the old school mates, the cedar tree they’d walk past everyday. “For 30 years, I’d grown up there, as well as my daughter. Stroud is going to be her home… That loss of the family home, of roots. I think if you want a settled community of people who care about each other, you need to make things stable and affordable, [including] affordable housing.”
Stroud District Council: ‘Addressing housing needs is a key priority’
Louise and Nia’s experiences are far from unique, and show the knock-on impact that steepening house prices are having. Those on low incomes trying to access subsidised housing have been particularly affected. It’s been reported that the number waiting for social housing in the Stroud District is now the highest it’s been since 2018.
In a statement to Stroud Times, SDC explained “The causes of housing need are complex, and as of January 2025, there were 2,634 live applications on the HomeseekerPlus social housing register in Stroud District. Addressing housing needs is a key priority for Stroud District Council. This includes increasing supply of affordable homes, preventing housing debt, providing temporary housing for homeless people, and making the best use of housing in all tenures.”
The council say they’ve created 975 new affordable homes in the past 5 years, through housebuilding and working with housing associations and others. Starting this April, council charges for owners of underused properties will double, affecting 535 second homes and 119 empty properties.
Delays in housebuilding “has led to increased house prices and rental costs”
“The Government estimates around 300,000 new homes are needed annually to meet demand”, a SDC spokesperson said. “However, the actual number of new homes built has often fallen short of this target, exacerbating the housing shortage. This shortfall has led to increased house prices and rental costs, making home ownership and renting less affordable for many.”
To help tackle this, the Labour Government aim to build 1.5 million new homes across the country before the next parliament. Local councils can submit a ‘local plan’ outlining how house building targets can be met and where developments should and shouldn’t be. However, in February 2025 SDC’s draft local plan, which included a blueprint for 12,000 additional homes, was found ‘unsound’ by inspectors due to transport infrastructure issues and not implemented.
SDC said: “Stroud District Council needs to allocate space for 820 new homes per year in the district and this is challenging but the Council is determined to seek a way forward for its Draft Local Plan which is the blueprint for development until 2040.”
Stroud’s housing challenges highlight the unfortunate fallout of the area’s national acclaim, which has undercut affordable homes for low-income locals. Rising property prices and demand for housebuilding create a cocktail of issues to address, with councils across the country wrestling similar problems. Ultimately, helping people live in the area they grew up in while fostering a permeable and embracing community will take assertive planning and ongoing effort, ensuring the fruits of Stroud’s magnetic popularity can be shared by all.
*Louise and Nia are using different names to protect their families’ anonymity.
