You'd be surprised. 1hr commute from London in reality is 40 minutes on the train (10 minutes walk either side, even getting out of a major train station takes that long). And 40 minutes ride from central London is Sevenoaks, Reading, St. Albans, and zone 6 commuter towns like Amersham or Borehamwood -- your 3-bed semi will still cost you half a million pounds if not much more. (Thanks to the NIMBY policy that designated dozens square miles of farms inside the M25 as "green belt" and dozens more as private golf courses...)