Got admission in oversubscribed school but we need to move

[divs59]

Dear Parents, We desperately need your advise or opinions please help.
So we used to live in Hounslow, but were looking for buying a house near a very good school in Harrow which has a very close proximity to a very good school and to be honest that was our primary criteria for buying the house in that area. So we finally agreed an offer..and somehow after paying a huge rent for 2 months got the agreement to rent the same property till the completion completes. This rush was all due to the deadline of the school admissions. So we moved to our dream home, although rented for now and submitted the revised application with new address which was just 10 houses away from the school and DD got the admission letter that she has been accepted..All good so far !!!

The day we got the letter, next day we found the property has some unwanted guests..and it was rats..we called in the pest control and they say its a big infestation we are talking about that could take months to clear up but still no idea what impact they have done so far to the structure etc... Now my panic attack started as we have 2 kids..one 4 which is due to Reception in September and other one 2 months old. After long discussions, we are planning to pull the plug of the sale as I cant stand the house which has infestation and on top of that we moved to new house as it was good built and needed no work but now lots of work we can see coming our way which is dangerous to my children lives..house is inhabitable at a moment with the kids..the landlord didnt disclosed any such issues, we specifically by co incidence ask the estate agent before we put an offer about rat or mice infestation and he clearly said no they are not aware of it.

My question hence..we are now lookout for a rented flat (given the fact we sold our old house so no shelter at a moment) ..if we rent any flat in the same area but in most likely case it will not be same proximity to the school as there is nothing in the market as close to the school as this house was..will my DD be removed from that school admission ?
We will still be inside the admission area and we will still be on lookout for any property to buy close to the school but at this stage we dont know. Please advise what should we really do, should we move to rented flats which is little far than the current house or should we move to hotel till we find something to rent or to buy within same distance from the school.

Please throw your opinions or if you know any authority we can speak to..like council themselves or anyone then please suggest.

[admission]

I will assume that you are talking about a school that is a LA maintained school and is therefore using the admission criteria defined by Harrow Council. If the school is their own admission authority then you need to check exactly what that school's admission criteria says.
For a maintained school the information is the guidance booklet from Harrow Council. The address that is relevant is the address on the closing date for applications, that is 15th January 2016. If you were in residence on that date then that is the correct address and you have been allocated a place based on that address. Whilst the moving around might cause a few red flags at the council, providing that you can show that you were intending to stay at the address well after the closing date but for the unfortunate extra inhabitants you should not have a problem with a move to another nearby property

[divs59]

Thank you. Yes it is state school and admissions process is by council. We just got the letter on Saturday about the place for our daughter and on Sunday we found this horrible part of the story.

We just received the report from agency carrying out the survey and it is absolutely dangerous for my kids to live --confirmed by Housing advice Harrow. In this case I believe we have all the proofs that this move was absolutely necessary for health and safety reasons and thats the reason we will be renting out till we can get something to buy.
Should we even phone up the school admissions and share this to be transparent or should we simply change the accommodation and inform the school as and when we move.

[Akire]

I would send documents along to school with a letter all sound very above board but you can bet someone will find out "you got place over them and not even living there". so think look better to be open with school from start than look like proving it after. Not that you should have too but some people look for any reason to get their child into a decent school and Will be prepared to fight it out if anyone may have broken rules.

[Floggingmolly]

. The vendor who accepted your offer on the house he was selling allowed you to move in and rent it while you were awaiting completion?
Then you moved in, applied for a school place and the day after you were allocated a place you discovered you had rats so moved out, reneging on both the sake and rental agreements?
Not a sign of a rat for the three month period between application and allocation, but they set up camp the very day after you didn't need the house any more...
Explain to the Council. They'll never probably have heard weirder tales.

[CotswoldStrife]

The admission deadline is January, which school did you apply to then?

[LIZS]

If you've only just got the place presumably it was from waiting list not the normal application round. You'd need to tell them otherwise all the joining info and arrangements for home visit , if they do one, will go awry.

[Floggingmolly]

How did you get mortgage approval for a house condemned by Harrow Council as being too dangerous for your children to live in?

[CotswoldStrife]

LIZS the OP says that the 'rush was all due to the deadline' and yet the letter arrived on Saturday? They must have put in an application in January as well and got a place somewhere.

[PatriciaHolm]

I'm assuming the timeline went something like this -

• moved into this rented house just before closure of applications (Jan 15, 2016)
• lived there for 3 months without issue?
• received offer on April 18th (though this was a Monday so not sure how this fits into getting a letter on a Saturday)
• then discovered infestation
• has since has experts into review and has been told home is uninhabitable? So will be moving out asap.

Whilst it all seems rather odd, the timeline above would fit the letter of the law on primary admissions in Harrow in that it was the child's permanent address at the close of applications, assuming OP didn't still own their home in Hounslow at the time. If they did. everything gets a bit murkier.

[lougle]

It does seem remarkably bad (?good) luck to have found out that you were rat infested just one day after being notified of the school place.

[LIZS]

So op has spent 2 months living in a house not fit for habitation

[TroubleinDaFamily]

And the band played believe it if you will.

[lougle]

I know. Imagine living alongside the rats for all that time without a clue and then boom! Suddenly you realise you have a whole civilisation cohabiting with you .

[user789653241]

First time I read OP, I didn't really understand what was going on.(I'm a foreigner)
Now if I'm correct, op lived in the house for 2 months not knowing it was rat infested. And now it's found out, she is moving house... And she wants to keep school place allocated for that address.....?

[Lurkedforever1]

I don't claim to know a great deal about admissions. However I do know that if somewhere has such a bad rat infestation it will take months to clear, there is no way on earth you wouldn't notice within 24hours, let alone needing a few months. In fact it would be reasonable to assume a rat problem on that scale would be fairly difficult to hide just during viewing. And I'm guessing that someone in admissions would be equally sceptical about it.

[SouthWestmom]

Guys, op was renting, agreed a purchase on the new house with rental beforehand, moved in and got the letter then found the rats.

[user789653241]

noeuf, I am still confused. Admission dead line was in January. The child have to live there, right? And school allocation was in April. Where was she living in between then, if she didn't notice rats?

[icclemunchy]

My OH is a pest controller. He says any infestation bad enough to condemn a building should be obvious from across the street let alone by living there

[icclemunchy]

Also were local and he's not aware of such a severe problem anywhere in Harrow (not that he's all knowing but news travels and an infestation that bad would affect many properties) what company did you have out OP? Which EHO did you get?

[SouthWestmom]

Sorry Irvine

I thought op applied on the basis of moving to the new address although not actually living there in January but proved this to the council

[user789653241]

Yes, agree, noeuf. It could be the case. But still confused. I wish OP comes back and clarify. Otherwise we just keep on speculating!

[CotswoldStrife]

I was assuming that the rat house was property number three. Property one they owned and sold, they rented property two for two months (huge rent) and then moved to property three - the rate house - which was also referred to as their dream home.

It is confusing! I assume they were at property one or two when they applied for the school place.

[LIZS]

They wouldn't have got a place at a high demand school in Harrow from a Hounslow address. I assumed only 2 addresses - the one they have since sold and the rat house which they rented before expecting to buy.

[Floggingmolly]

They applied for a school place from the rat house. The first furry friend made his appearance two/three months later, the day after the school place had been allocated.
The day after that, the house was assessed by the council as being unfit for human habitation, despite the op awaiting completion on it's purchase (whilst somewhat confusingly living there at the same time).
Maybe the school admissions team will believe it. I don't.

[lougle]

No, I read it as they were living in property 1 until, say late December/Early January 2016, but really needed to be in dream house by Jan 15th 2016 to make cut off for school application deadline. Realising that they wouldn't force the sale through in time, they convinced vendor that they could rent at huge cost in mean time. So, huge relief they moved in to dream house just before application deadline.

Now, the family live in domestic bliss for almost 3 calendar months from January 15th until April 18th, which is National Offers day. The much anticipated offer letter drops through the door, and the family is happy. But...the story doesn't finish there. Oh no.

The very next day, there is a scurry of tiny feet. A whisker, a dropping or two. To their dismay, the family discover that they have been sharing their home with a family of rats. So bad is the as yet undiscovered infestation that the property is uninhabitable, the sale must be terminated and they must move to a property that is much further away from the school.

Of course, had they applied from that address in the first place, they would never have got a place at the sought after school, but because they managed to secure the house in the interim they did. Lucky/unlucky....depends how you view it, I guess.