Relocation stays in Manchester
Relocation accommodation in Manchester
Somewhere proper to live in Manchester while you work out where you actually want to live. Furnished, bills included, no twelve month tenancy signed in a city you do not know yet.
Or call reservations on 0333 880 7213
The short answer
Somewhere to land in Manchester before you commit to anywhere.
Relocation accommodation is a furnished whole property taken for a month or several while you find a permanent home. It exists because the alternative is signing a twelve month tenancy on a street you have never seen, from a photograph, before the job has even started. We let whole apartments and houses in Manchester on that basis: everything furnished, every bill included, no referencing and no deposit scheme, and you extend or leave when you are ready. Manchester is the market we started in and the one we know best.
Called a few different things
This gets called relocation accommodation, relocation housing, temporary accommodation, interim accommodation, a serviced apartment, a short term let, corporate relocation housing, or simply somewhere to stay while you look. Employers relocating somebody usually call it relocation accommodation and pay for a fixed number of weeks.
The mistake worth avoiding
Signing for a year in a city you have been in for four days.
Everybody who has moved for work has a version of this story: the flat that looked fine online and turned out to be the wrong side of a dual carriageway, an hour from the office, on a twelve month agreement. A month or two somewhere decent, while you actually walk the areas and do the commute in the rain, costs less than the mistake does. It suits you if:
Where you would be
Working out where you actually want to live in Manchester.
The centre is smaller than it looks
Manchester's core is walkable end to end in twenty five minutes, from Deansgate through the Northern Quarter to Piccadilly. People arriving from London consistently overestimate how far apart things are and end up committing to the wrong side of town. Spend the first month in the middle and walk it before you decide anything.
The tram decides more than the postcode
Metrolink reaches Altrincham, Bury, Rochdale, MediaCity and the airport, and where the line goes is what makes a suburb liveable rather than what it looks like on a map. Chorlton, Sale, Didsbury and Prestwich all feel very different in person and all look equally reasonable online. Do the commute in the rain before you sign anything.
Where the work actually is
Spinningfields and St Peter's Square for professional services, NOMA and Ancoats for tech and media, MediaCity at Salford Quays for broadcast, and the universities and hospitals along Oxford Road. Which of those you are heading to every morning should decide where you look, and it is the question most people answer last instead of first.
What the first month is really for
Finding the supermarket you will actually use, working out whether you want a garden enough to give up the walk to work, and discovering that the area everybody recommended is not the one that suits you. That is worth a month of not being tied to anything, which is the whole argument for doing it this way round.
What a week actually costs here
Manchester is cheaper than London and not cheap. Rent is the obvious gap, but the one people notice is that a car becomes optional in the centre and near essential three miles out, and that changes the monthly figure more than the rent does. Work out the whole number for two or three areas before you fall in love with one.
The weather is a real variable
It rains, and not dramatically, just persistently between October and March. That is not a joke about the north, it is a planning input: a fifteen minute walk to the tram that is fine in September is a different proposition in February, and it is the single most common reason people move again after their first year.
Schools, if the family is coming
Catchments here are tight and the popular ones are tighter, and applications work on the address you hold at the deadline rather than the one you intend to hold. If children are following you, find out the deadline in the first fortnight, because it constrains where you can live far more than your budget does.
Give it a weekend before you decide
Most people see an area on a Tuesday afternoon when it is quiet and pleasant. Go back on a Friday night and a Sunday morning. The Northern Quarter, Ancoats and parts of Salford are different places at those hours, and whether that is a reason to move there or away from there is entirely personal.
Booking direct
The same property, without the platform's cut.
Our properties are on Airbnb and Booking.com as well, and you are welcome to book there. Booking direct also avoids the guest service fee the big platforms add on top, which on a longer Manchester stay is not a small number. Booking with us direct also means you are talking to the people who actually run the property rather than a message thread inside an app, which matters when you need an early check-in or an extra week.
Message reservations rather than booking night by night. A month or more is priced differently from a run of nights, and if your employer is paying we will invoice them directly with a purchase order reference.
In every property
What is actually there when you arrive.
Manchester questions
What people ask about staying in Manchester.
Which part of Manchester should I be in?
Most of what you would need day to day sits in the city centre, the Northern Quarter, Ancoats and the inner suburbs. Tell us where you need to be each morning rather than which postcode you fancy, and we will be honest about what is close to it and what only looks close.
Can I park in Manchester?
Most of the city centre is permit or paid parking and a lot of apartment blocks have no allocated space at all. If you are bringing a car, ask about the specific property, because it is the single most common thing people get wrong here.
How easy is it to get around Manchester without a car?
Metrolink reaches Altrincham, Bury, Rochdale, MediaCity and the airport from the middle of the city, and Piccadilly puts London inside two hours.
What is there to do in Manchester on a day off?
The Northern Quarter, Ancoats, Castlefield and the museums are all walkable from a central base, and the Peak District is inside an hour by train or car. On a long stay the Peaks are what most people end up using at weekends.
Questions we get asked
What people moving here ask us.
Can my employer be invoiced?
Yes, and it is common with a relocation package. We invoice the company for the agreed number of weeks with a purchase order reference, and you extend privately after that if you need longer.
How long do people usually stay?
Six to twelve weeks is the common shape: long enough to find somewhere permanent, do the referencing and wait out a notice period. The rate improves past the first month, so tell us your best guess and we will price it for that rather than for a fortnight.
Is there a tenancy or a credit check?
No. This is a booking, not a tenancy, so there is no referencing, no guarantor and no protected deposit. That is particularly useful if you have just moved country and have no UK credit history yet, which is the thing that stops most relocations dead.
Can the family come once I have found somewhere?
Yes, and it is worth telling us at the start. Whether you need two bedrooms from week one or from week five changes which property makes sense, and moving you twice helps nobody.
Check availability
Tell us when you land.
Message reservations with your start date, how many of you there are and roughly where you will be working, and we will tell you what makes sense.
Reservations, seven days a week, on 0333 880 7213