Moving into rented accommodation in the catchment area-when can I safely move back?

When we moved from the midlands to London we had to provide our old tenancy and council tax info an the new stuff to prove that it was a genuine relocation not to get into a good school. Dd had to wait another 3 weeks after term restarted before she was allowed to join the school.

During this time I was constantly ringing school an council for updates and we were being checked by the la to assess our application.

If you are in London tread very very carefully.

CountingClouds - You say, "Despite all the scare stories no one is going to pull your child out of a school".

You are wrong. As other posters have pointed out it happens all the time.

Of course some people manage to cheat the system successfully but many do not. In a typical year LAs in England detect around 1400 fraudulent applications.

To the poster who said they will not remove the child from the school. They can and will.

3 children in DS1 year 7 class started school and then had their places withdrawn and had to leave.
2 children in DDs year 7 class had their places withdrawn.

This was due to fraudulent claims ie renting a house in catchment and not actually planning on living there.
Our LA is very strict on this as it happens a lot

They no longer just accept that people live where they say. They investigate any application where the family has moved to the catchment area within 6 months of the application deadline.

If the OPs user name reflects where she lives, it may be the same LA.

Did you give them your name?

Well, what are suggesting is illegal and the LA will find out eventually (someone will report you)
And then you will have to explain your actions to your dc.
Great parenting there!

If you rent near a popular school and still own another house the LA is likely to regard this as suspicious and may treat your application as if it was from your permanent address. If you return to your permanent address after getting a place at your preferred school (or, indeed, if anything else happens that makes the LA think you gave misleading information on the application form) the LA is entitled to withdraw the offer even if your child has already started at the school.

You may get away with it but the risks if it goes wrong are high. You could find that your child ends up at a much worse school than would have been offered if you had been honest about your address.

Actually you might not have wanted it more than someone else, you might just have had more money.

I moved to get my kids into a good school - I went through all the hassle, expense and abuse...and I would do it all again. The way I see it - I wanted the place more than someone else did and if the government can't provide adequate good schools then its up to me to find one......you have to do what's right for your kids - there are no second chances.

Just to point out that for some people this can be a genuine worry. My SIL lives with just her ds. About 6 months before she had to apply for schools, her landlord put up the rent to affordable levels so she had to look for a new place to rent.
Obviously school places were going to be a huge factor in her decision. Thing was, all local schools would withdraw the place if you were further away in the Sept when the children started school. And while some landlords would agree to a year contract, none wanted sign up for 18 months to an unknown tenant, especially an unemployed single mother with small child!

Eventually we found one who agreed to an 18 month initial term though with break clauses, as at least that signalled her intent to stay. Required DH being a guarantor and 2 months rent in advance though.

Given the crapness of the landlord in doing repairs etc she would have preferred to move again but wouldn't risk her son having to move school.

The school has removed places before. Dn is one of 3 non-siblings in his year of 60.

hilarious that you actually called up two LEA's to ask this question. i hope gave them your child's name so they know to bin the application when they get it.

Even if OP moved permanently, she would be "depriving" someone else from a place....and if the house prices go up the nearer you get to the school gate then the richest can buy their way in to the detriment of those in cheaper houses on outskirts of the catchment.

Moral minefield!

(But short term rent is fraudulent, that said. Just not sure it is morally more suspect than other practices.)

As others have said, you would need to stay long enough to satisfy all the LEA's anti-fraud checks. And, frankly, unless you sell your current house, that may be never.

Several posters seem against this proposal. But I have met parents who used to think like that, and as soon as it came to forcing their own children to go to a local 'less than good' school, guess what happened? Their views flipped as fast as a pancake.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with doing everything within your power to get your DC into a good school and I would say its your morale responsibility to do so. Its essentially an active protest against the state who are trying to force children into a sub-standard education.

Who's to say you are taking a place from someone who 'genuinely' deserves it? How many other family's have used money to live in the area? Its really the teachers, head, school, council or governments fault for not providing a good education to all children. It certainly isn't the parents.

As someone has already said this is no different than parents who use religion (genuinely or not) to abuse the system and get their children into good schools. That's a bigger scandal.

OFSTED reports are not currently a good guide to how schools are doing, unless its from this year. The inspection has just been changed to a more rigorous one, so you cant compare schools until they have all been redone. The previous system seemed to hand out good and outstanding ratings to schools that were only treading water.

I would rent out a few months before you fill in the application and stay until a few months after your DC starts the school. Don't tell the school your new address until the year after, they only ask for your it once a year anyway. Despite all the scare stories no one is going to pull your child out of a school they are already in, just because you decide to move house.

It really isnt so different to the other ways people get their children into good schools - whether that be by relegion or £.

Except it is. It prevents a child who is genuinely entitled to a place from getting in. It is using ££ and dishonesty.

How far away is your house from the secondary school? I don't believe you have to stay in catchment as presumably that catchment changes each year but I would imagine you would need to be a reasonable distance away. Personally, I would stay for at least year 7.

A question to those of you saying how wrong it is - do you happen to have a good local secondary school? If not, what do you plan to do? I understand what drives people to this. It really isnt so different to the other ways people get their children into good schools - whether that be by relegion or £.

OK - you need to move before the date when applications close. I'd allow a good two months before that, to ensure you have changed all admin, reregistered at doctors etc (councils in areas where this is a common attempted ruse will check all sorts of stuff, so you need everything to this address). Ideally, your DC moves school, but you can probably swing the 'excessive disruption' card for a child in year 6. But you need to apply for places local to new address for all younger children at the time of your move (and this will be readily visible to admissions office).

It will help if you can show that you have totally relinquished old address, so quitting old tenancy completely is definitely necessary, and if selling ideally that would be complete before deadline too (how well does property shift in your current area? Might want to get on with marketing now, if you will be applying in next round).

You need to stay at the new address throughout the applications process, and beyond (as you can be stripped of a place if the move is adjudged fraudulently temporary even after DC has started. I'd say for the whole of year 7 as a minimum. By which time, you may as well stay, especially as sibling priority isn't a given for secondaries.

In this area if you are renting you have to prove you have a minimum of a two year tenancy. Fwiw I think what you are proposing to do is very wrong.

Many Catholic schools require baptism to have taken place within three months of birth. My son is Catholic but on that basis it wouldn't be enough as he was not baptised until he was 9 yrs old. As our local Catholic secondary takes a large number (about 40%) of non Catholics this will be okay but I am aware that the very popular London Catholic schools are very over subscribed so do enforce the baptism rule. Where about in the country are you currently? Does it have to be London?

Yes it's still legal for you to do this...many parents do it either by buying in the catchment area or renting. I think the local authorities are cracking down on those who rent just long enough to get a place. Some though just rent a flat etc and never even live there...that is more likely to be detected. If you live somewhere for year though and are paying council tax there etc it wouldn't be detectable I wouldn't have thought.

OP you must be desperate. Is the 'EN' in your name a clue to the post code? If so tread carefully, there have been many places taken away ( quite rightly) after offer, once the school investigate the addresses further, inc. how long renting before & after with some (repeat offender) addresses having already been blacklisted by the school !

This could mean ending up with no offer/offered a school that is worse than your (true) local would have been.

I do sympathise but I think you are naive if you think this is a straight forward solution.

Threads like this make me so sad.......

We would all move heaven and earth for our kids , but really? You must know this is wrong?

Cross posts.