Terraced streets dominate Stanley, row after row of them, and the For Sale boards you'll see are almost always outside a two-up-two-down rather than anything grander. This is a former colliery town in County Durham, and it still carries that shape: dense, unpretentious, built for people who worked locally rather than commuted out. The population sits in its early forties on average, older than the national norm, and the streets feel like a place people settle into rather than pass through. The practical picture is straightforward but it needs honesty. House prices here sit far below the national figure, and even against County Durham itself Stanley is cheaper by a noticeable margin — this is a place where a terrace can be bought for a fraction of what the same bricks would cost further south. Almost every sale is freehold, which keeps ongoing costs simple. Schools are a mixed bag: Tanfield School posts a strong progress score that suggests pupils do better than expected by the end of secondary, while North Durham Academy's numbers point the other way, so which side of town you land matters more than the average suggests. Broadband is solid, with full-fibre reaching most of the town, which matters if working from home is part of the plan given how car-dependent commuting out of Stanley tends to be. Green space is genuinely abundant — well over a hundred sites and close to 250 hectares of it, more generous per head than the regional norm — so the weekend rhythm here leans outdoors rather than café-hopping. What the town doesn't offer in numbers is nightlife or a deep restaurant scene; the grading here is the one flat note against an otherwise decent set of marks, and it's worth knowing before you commit. Crime is the other honest conversation: violence and anti-social behaviour make up more than half of recorded incidents, and the overall rate runs somewhat higher than the County Durham average, though the direction of travel is described as improving rather than worsening, which counts for something if you're watching a trend rather than a snapshot. Stanley suits people prioritising affordability and space over polish — those who want a house, not a flat, and who don't need a buzzing high street to feel settled. It's a town for the practical over the flashy, where your money goes further into bricks and garden than it would almost anywhere else in England, and where the trade-off is a quieter evening economy and a safety picture that's better than it was but still asks you to pick your street with a little care.