Chris Read wrote:

Too far from the coast for whimsical day trips - certainly by public
transport.

A matter of prefence - that one never bothered me, though that said I
don't object to the odd walk on the beach at Scheveningen while over
here in .nl

Too far from genuinely outstanding or interesting countryside (sorry
Chilterns - South Downs/Lake District/Suffolk coast you ain't).

That I do miss, having previously lived in the North West and so had
the Lakes, Peaks and North Wales nearby, the Dales not too far and
Scotland a bit closer. That said, it's only a couple of hours by train
to Manchester, though cost does of course figure in that.

Paucity of cultural interest

It has a successful theatre and art gallery, and there is history, you
just have to look for it.

Functional but uninspiring architecture

This is true in places.

'Stepford wives' image of identikit population - deserved or otherwise.

It has "chavs", but so does any large town or city. It does have a
very transient population by its nature, but I don't think that always
counts against it.

For those after 'good schools', IIRC the Bucks selective system does not
extend to MK, hence a choice of bog standard comps which, when I last read
the school league tables, did not perform especially well.

Two of the schools (Denbigh and Shenley Brook End) have a very good
reputation, though two more (the names of which escape me) aren't
reputed to be as good. Beware of the league tables. My comprehensive
(which nonetheless called itself Ormskirk Grammar) was a superb school
in just about every way, which was known to all locally. It didn't
feature very high in the league tables because it refused to write off
"low performers" by entering them for lower-level exams and selecting
them out of the sixth form, but instead gave everyone who attended a
good opportunity to learn. This, stupidly, resulted in an average
league table rating, as I recall.

I know it has good shops, but these days that's not much of a USP. Anyway,
my old fashioned view is that shopping is best conducted in a high street
with lots of hustle and bustle and traffic and noise, not a soulless mall.

MK shopping centre has all of that bar traffic, but it can be a bit
soulless, yes. My preference with shopping involves going in, getting
what I want and going out in the shortest amount of time possible,
though, so it suits me fine

But a much lower probability of market-beating price growth in the future.

This is probably true; house prices in MK are very reasonable for the
(edge of the) South East.

Neil