For which period do I need to live near secondary school for applications

There is no easy answer to this. It is true that house prices near good schools act as a form of selection by wealth. Random allocation helps to get round this but makes it hard for parents to know whether their child is likely to get a place.

It is still the case that parental income is the best predictor of a child's academic success. The link in England is weaker than it was a decade or so ago, and much weaker than in Scotland, but it is still there.

In our LA they are wise to this as so many people try it for an outstanding school. If you still own a property and yet live in rented close to the school they will use your OWNED property as the address for the application. We had to provide our deeds of sale after we made our application to prove we had actually sold our previous house and hadn’t just rented or bunked in with relatives closer.

I’m sure there are genuine cases (divorce etc.) but in our LA they will investigate to ensure it’s not made up (fraud).

I understand you don’t care about the morality, but you are naive if you think sought after schools aren’t wise to this and don’t have procedures to check.

Sure. I wasn’t eliding legitimate home buying and dodgy mock ‘home’ rentals.

My point was just that one way or another the well-heeled middle classes elbow their way into better comps. By using their money.

It’s a form of stealthy private education (along with the tutors, crammers, etc.) but allows the bien pensant proudly to declare their ‘principled’ rejection of private schooling.

There are parents who buy a house in the catchment area of their favoured school to get a place. Provided they actually live there, that is regarded as acceptable, even if they move out afterwards, although some LAs now guard against people moving out by refusing sibling priority in that situation.

Many LAs now have lists of addresses used for short term lets to get school places and treat applications from those addresses with suspicion. Most, probably all, LAs check applications against Council Tax data and other information to check that the parents actually live at the address claimed and that they don't own a house elsewhere in the area.

Of course, some will slip through the net and will get a place fraudulently. However, a proportion of those who think they have done so are wrong. If the LA discovers that an incorrect address has been used, they are required to consider the application as if it had been made using the correct address. In some cases, the child would still have got a place. So the parents think they have gamed the system and got a place for their child, when in fact all they have done is wasted some money on letting a property.

Occasionally the authorities are over-diligent and treat applications as fraudulent when they are not. I have helped a number of parents in this situation.

Actually I wouldn't much care about this BUT I would worry it would be time, effort and expense that wouldn't achieve my goal. Then if it did I would worry about the place being withdrawn at some point.
LEAs arent stupid, they know this goes on and presumably have some way of dealing with it, especially when it comes to popular schools. Some might slip through but do you want to explain to your child why they have to leave the school they just started and go to one nobody wants and is miles away?

Very very unlikely unless its a Private school.
This is the sort of dangerous mis information that causes so many problems around admissions.
They had a space, you qualified under their admissions criteria - end of.

It definitely happens.

Renting for eg 6 months might cost 15-20k including 2 sets of removals, if successful in getting child 1 in, then child 2 would likely get in through sibling rule.
Expensive ...but nowhere near as expensive as private school, or presumably moving by buying a house in the catchment area of a popular school.

Not condoning it, just looking at the logic that lots would think it was money well spent

No you didn't.

I am unclear what you think is being made up. However, it is correct that a place can be withdrawn even after the child starts at school if it is found that the application was fraudulent or deliberately misleading.

That be will cost thousands! Is the local school really that bad?

Incredibly, there are posters on MN who deny that the state system is gamed by better off parents who move into catchment areas.

I worked in admissions for a while and can confirm we withdrew places when this was found to have taken place. The child was then just offered whichever was the nearest place available- by that point that could be anywhere. Don’t risk it.

In Hertfordshire what you are planning is classed as admission fraud and you'd risk being investigated and the place withdrawn. So it wouldn't be the case that you could rent near the school until March and then just move back to your normal address. There is a lot of competition for the "good" state schools round here and the council are wise to people trying to play the system unfairly.

Scroll down on this page for full details:
https://www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/services/schools-and-education/school-admissions/secondary-and-upper-schools/secondary-and-upper-school-places.aspx

This inst an empty threat - they do actually investigate and you risk your child being then allocated a school which has places left, which may well not be a school you want and may be in an inconvenient location.

We had to submit a council tax bill from the previous year, and i thought I remembered something about child benefit (but I maybe not - I can't see how that's relevant!!)
I'm not sure what happened for people that had moved in a more recent time frame.

It’s designed to prevent local school places being taken away from local children.

What a strange concept. I don’t think you understand, @DibbleDooDah; the OP’s child is more important than local children.

Yes but a lot of the proof requires you to have lived there for months before application and have at least 12 month rolling rental contract.

It's not as simple as being thee on the day you apply and the day you get the place.

This is set to stop people doing what you plan to do.

So for our local secondary your plan wouldn't work, you're aren't allowed to own another home in the area and not use it as your main address,

We have people who sell their family homes, rent on the doorstep of the school and then re-buy further out once they are in.

Don't make things up 😂

Cheer up, OP. I suspect that everyone pointing out that you are asking for advice on how to commit address fraud won't stop you doing it, but at least the Admissions Code (para 2.13) actually says

Where an offer is withdrawn on the basis of misleading information, the application must be considered afresh, and a right of appeal offered if an offer is refused.

So if / when you are sussed, your DC might actually get in from the waiting list anyway. Or you might strike lucky with an independent appeal panel who agree with your pleading that your DC shouldn't be made to suffer through the attempt by their parent to gain them the place, that they truly need, more than the DC they displaced from their rightful place at the school according to the schools published admissions criteria, because..., through fraud. I mean, the chance is remote (and non existent if infant class size legislation is involved), but you never know.

Council tax, land registry

In our area if you are renting a property but own a house within 20 miles of the school, they will use your owned address for admissions and not the rented one. This rule applies regardless of whether you have rented your owned property out to someone else.

Several of the schools (mainly the grammars) also stipulate you need to have lived at your address for a considerable amount of time prior to the regular October cut off.

It’s designed to prevent local school places being taken away from local children.

Even renting out the OP's main house probably won't be enough. Many LAs would still insist on using that address.

Then unless you rent out your main house and stay in the rented house for longer they will not treat the rented property as your main residence.

Many people try to do this especially in popular school areas it's fraud and if you are found out they will remove the school place.

Either actually move or look at other schools.

Each LA will have different criteria but the areas where schools places are hotly competed for will be wise to all the scams and will do extra checks for popular schools. Plus don’t ever underestimate other parents blowing the whistle. all it takes is for someone who knows where you really live to also know someone else who didn’t get it, dots will be connected and someone will complain which will trigger an investigation.this could be months after your child starts school.