Visited UK recently, wandered around south-east counties. Didn't feel like a poor country. In poor countries, things are cheap. In UK, things are expensive, so people have money.

UK is the most expensive third-world country I've had the displeasure of visiting (and before that, living in).

If you want the extreme of "cheap and run down", some Eastern European countries fit the bill. If you want the other extreme of "expensive and well-kept", Switzerland.

But Britain is in a unique place of both "expensive and run down".

Repeat this experiment in the North of England, or anywhere but the South-East