Do people REALLY move house to get into a good school?

[Ijustwanttoretire]

Apparently 'The average house value in England is £247,000 but parents face taking on loans of up to £180,000 more to live near a top-rated school.' Really? Does your average family move house to get into a better senior school? £180000 would buy a decent house where I live, let alone paying that much extra to get into a good catchment area. So how many MNers have ACTUALLY done this?

Is that quotation lifted directly from an article? It is very, very poor reporting if so.

The average house price in England is £247k.

The highest premium that anyone pays anywhere for school catchment is £180k. It is lazy click bait to conflate the two and it would be much more accurate to present the premium as a percentage.

If you live somewhere where a family house costs £180k then by definition you do not live in an area where people are paying as much again as a catchment premium. It’s probably more like £15-20k.

We chose our house based on schools, I wasn’t even pregnant at the time when we started looking. We had our first child 2 weeks after we got the keys, our child starts school next year at the school which feeds into an outstanding high school. We also got both our children christened just to bump us up the list further.

We can’t afford to educate our children privately but I’ve made dam sure that they get the best state education in the area we live. We knew we wanted children so we just forward planned and made sure we got the area right so we didn’t need to move, I’d move if I had to though.

Not a new phenomenon either. My children are in their mid 20s now and it was common when they were school age. One family we knew were renting near our primary school. As their son approached year 6, they left that rental, took another one right next to a sought after comprehensive but (importantly) also on a direct bus route two miles back to our area so he could travel back to the primary school on his own. He got a place at the comp and shortly after that his family bought a home back in our area, so when he started secondary he took the same bus but in the opposite direction. He would never have got into that school from our area, as it was too far away.

All done to avoid the comp in our area which had a very poor reputation.

Yes. My village's schools have a really good rep and people do move here because of that.

We moved to be more conveniently located for our chose private school (some families gave moved from completely different areas to be close enough to send their children to this school). Catchments obviously don’t apply, we just did it for convenience (20 minute commute rather than 40).

It’s one of the things we considered when buying a house. Discounted some houses because of the catchment school.

At least here (for primary at least) siblings outside of catchment are lower priority than children in catchment, which seems a far fairer way of doing it.

At least here (for primary at least) siblings outside of catchment are lower priority than children in catchment, which seems a far fairer way of doing it

Yes same here

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Just to lob a grenade into this debate, I haven't read the whole thread so don't know if anyone's already said this - but it really annoys me when people who have done this very thing, or would have done if they deemed it necessary, look down their noses at those who sent their children to fee-paying schools for very similar reasons. If you have the cash and nous to move areas for schools, how is that different from using the same cash and nous to pay for your child's education directly? Please don't say it's because the sought after state school full of well supported kids from aspirational backgrounds is more like the real world than a private school.

When we bought our house, we wouldn't even consider areas where the schools weren't very good.

Yes, purchased house before I was pregnant based on the fact that it was within the catchment of the best primary and secondary school in our area. Moved from a house in a slightly nicer road to do this. 100% worth it for us, in the school of choice, kids happy.

Sorry wrong thread, meant to post somewhere else .😒

YABU. I don't have the link to hand but there was a BBC article the other day analysing the baby boom (peak was 2017 for primary) which will peak for secondary in 2024. My DD was born in 2012. We are in outer London and are not in reliable catchment for ANY schools due to population growth and lack of school building. When we moved here a decade and a half ago this wasn't an issue. As it turned out, DD would have got into the local primary in 2017 (but not the previous 3 years) due to a small decline in applications - I suspect because the referendum slightly slowed down EU emigration to here.

It's a straight choice for us: move, continue to pay for private or trust the govt to create enough school spaces in time. I don't trust the govt to do it in time especially as it all has to be done indirectly through academies.

I'd say it's 50/50 we move. I really don't want to!

I'm sure the vast, vast majority of parents would prefer to use a reasonable local primary and secondary, but increasing numbers of us don't actually have that option. And that's before you get into religion, gender and selection...

Yes, absolutely. We did and looked at the cost of private education vs. increased house cost.

House prices vary massively depending on where you live in the country. An average, not particularly nice, 3 bed semi costs around £500k around here, but might be £350k in a less popular part of the city. A 4 bed terrace or semi costs around £750k near the good school, more like £500k in the more distant parts of the city.

Its not always about the school as such, but the demographic of the families who attend that are more "desirable".

Yes we did this.
I think it's probably hard to understand unless you live in an area where the schools are dire. To be fair when we bought our first house kids/schools weren't at the forefront of our minds. Impossible to get into a good school around here but unless you're in catchment

I haven’t done it, DS is only 2. But I absolutely would do it.

Yes people really do!

A least here in SE London, I know of at least 2 couples who have done a house move to get into the catchment area of a primary/secondary school

If you live in a 'black hole' where you are out of catchment for all the local schools, it can be a massive issue, especially when you end up being sent to a school that a few miles away

Getting into your local school in SE London is definitely not something that his guaranteed! you do sometimes have to make the move to make it happen, and that can add £££ to your mortgage, but that's the way it is

Or else move out of London, but that's not always an option

If you have the cash and nous to move areas for schools, how is that different from using the same cash and nous to pay for your child's education directly?

DH saw one of his partners on the verge of bankruptcy, paying for his 3 children to go to private schools. We were not prepared to live like that for 20 years. We moved out of SE London, to a small town with outstanding comprehensives - bigger detached house (as opposed to an end of terrace), bigger garden, a garage (rather than having to park on the streets), a drive, less traffic which can go above 11 mph, less aggressive driving, less crime (burgled 2x in London); so a far better quality of life. All for an increased house price of £60,000 - there is no way, we could have got private education for 3 for £60,000.

A friend of a friend, moved house to get her DC into a 'brilliant' school, once in they moved back out of catchment.

They are now in the process of moving schools as the school isn't as good as they thought it was.

Sort of. We got dd1 into our secondary of choice, but then moved into the catchment area of the school. We were moving anyway and the fact the house was in the catchment area was a big boon.

I would have moved years ago but DH didn't want to, it took many years for me to convince him. (I lived 17 years in a house I was never really happy in)

Re upheaval etc. Where we are, in a central London borough, catchments are 100 metres (sometimes less!). So moving doesn’t mean losing all friends/changing everything/missing clubs. We’re about to move for secondary catchment, but our lives as a whole won’t really change. Music/swimming and regular parks and clubs will stay the same.

My friends that I mentioned above (that rented a flat above a shop to get the school), moved a further 5 mins walk away once the children were in. That would have taken them out of the catchment area if this was pre-reception application.

Again, what are people supposed to do, suck it up for the sake of diversity? I feel sad sometimes that my childrens’ school is v white middle class, definitely lacking in the diversity that I love and enjoyed growing up with as a working class city kid - but it’s a case of either/or where we live. You can’t seem to have it both ways here. In our borough, the working class and poor are basically being ghettoised. We’ve ended up with posh bits with outstanding schools, and culturally and economically diverse bits with terrible schools. I couldn’t face sending my kids to the shit school just so that I’m not part of gentrification. I don’t have the answer to it all, but yes I’d make that choice again and again and don’t care who knows it.

Yes they do, and then get very upset that they still can't get a place at the school they want.

When we bought our family house school catchment was a big factor. Houses near undesirable poor schools were prob c. ,£150k less based on similar features.

We chose a wide area to look in, then selected for which schools we were hapoy with, checked the school place allocation data and didn't bother looking at houses which were too far away. It cost us more it was worth it as friends who ignored schools are now scrabbling to move, struggling & facing stamp duty bills.

Didn’t get further than @onefootinthegrave. Bang on.