Moving house and school application deadlines

[Carolinaa]

Hi, we have just started to think we’d like to move house soon rather than wait until our existing mortgage expires. We will need to apply for a primary school place in Jan 2023. Have we left it too late to start the process to be in a new place by then? We’d have to do all the tidying, sell ours, find somewhere new and be in in time to apply. Our current house is our first so no experience of buying and selling. Thank you!

I put my house on the market at the beginning of Feb, it sold straight away. Took me a while to find somewhere, eventually did and put in an offer that was accepted in March. Here we are in August I am still waiting to move into the new house, we are close to it - 4 in the chain and myself and the house I'm buying are ready to exchange and complete just waiting on the other 2 to catch up.
I guess long story short it depends on how quickly yours sells and you find your next home - and how big the chain is. Good Luck!

I'd say wait, unless you are happy renting. We put ours on the market and sold it in the May and didn't move until the November. It was a fairly straightforward move too, not a ridiculously long chain, but there were just constant hiccups. We live in a very fast moving location for houses and had multiple offers on our house immediately. Our original buyer backed out (ON THE DAY OF EXCHANGE!! 😩) and then when we'd accepted another offer, there was an issue further up the chain with probate etc. Renting might be an option if you can afford?

Ah thanks both that’s what I suspected - we are 6 months too late to start thinking about this! We don’t really want the upheaval of moving twice if we rent. I guess if we found a house we loved it could be the back up plan though. Got to decide if we even want to start down this road or just write it off for now!