areas and secondary schools

[boredofbirmigham]

Hello lovely people we are planning to buy and move to liverpool/wirral by the summer . My son will start secondary so the school catchment it's crucial and also the area as i dont want a rough area . I know about liverpool but nothing about wirral. Can someone give me some areas to focus please? We are after 3 bed garden house budget 200k top. I saw also that house prices are way cheaper than liverpool ...why? Also how is commuting to liverpool? I have come across that seems that there is not much going on about activities on that side ... and that's why people prefer Liverpool .... thanks for giving me the hard honest truth :)

You do realise the application deadline for 2025 entry has passed ? That means submitting a late application and being offered whereever may be available rather than having a choice.

of course i know we did apply here for now so gonna be either a late application or in year transfer

It’s worth considering that Wirral has a grammar system. Liverpool’s best schools seem to be faith schools.

Also, there are some very privileged areas right next to very deprived areas in both places, it can be a very thin line between. In your budget obviously you are very unlikely to get one of the ‘not rough’ areas.

can you please tell me the areas ? tx

I don't know Liverpool particularly but I know several other cities of similar size and as a rule of thumb you can tell where the good schools are because that's where the houses are £100,000 more expensive than the same size of house elsewhere. If you are buying at the low end of the property market you are only going to be in-catchment for the less popular schools with difficult challenges and insufficient resources.

If you are moving from far enough away that you won't be caught out by rules about owning elsewhere while renting, my advice would be to rent a 2 bed flat in an area where you couldn't possibly afford to buy, and stay there until you have a satisfactory school place.

Use the government school details tool at www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/
to look at the "Progress 8" score for each school. In Wirral, Hilbre High School looks much better than the only other realistic option of West Kirkby (the grammar isn't realistic to hope for as a late entry). In Liverpool the school with the highest Progress 8 is St Hildas but that selects on Church Attendance. The next highest scores are North Liverpool Academy, West Derby School and St Edward's College (also religiously selective).

If the good schools are all oversubscribed you will get allocated an undesirable school in the first round due to being a late applicant. However there is always a second round of allocations after the first round acceptamce deadline to mop up any places that aren't accepted. If you are renting very close to a good school at that point you have a chance of getting a place then. This will only work if you don't have an owned property within a couple of hour's commute of the area.

I don’t know the areas in detail enough, but the areas I know are nice are beyond your budget like Allerton, Sefton Park and Childwall in Liverpool. I know the obvious places to avoid like Old Swan and Toxteth.

Wirral, I know Neston, Parkgate, Meols are lovely. But expensive. Wallasey and Birkenhead depends on the area. Bebbington is nice. Eastham might be an option anndnis on the Trainline to Liverpool. Other than that I’m not an expert!

Have you considered Ellesmere Port? Some nicer areas there and easy transport to Liverpool for work. Would be in your budget. Whitby high school the best option there.

You might get something in Crosby for this budget and would be nice to live there. You’d be lucky to get a terrace house with a yard in L17/L18/L25 with the budget, which are personally the only areas I’d look at. A flat around Sefton Park could be nice?

i have friends in Birkenhead and the commute into town is easy and house prices lower. Not the most picturesque place though - apart from the view over to Liverpool! Generally Wirral posher and nicer other side of motorway.

Did you start looking yet?

hello yup been up twice last week saw houses in west derby and decided to rent before buying as it's way too complicated from here to buy so renting first then looking at propertied to buy . However except sefton park area i do find houses in my budget to buy . so far i do really like calderston mossley area, west derby is ok ..then of course my fav is west kirby but i think i might stick to liverpool

exactly that's what im planning to do but houses to let are far cheaper than ugly birmigham (here i pay 1350 for a 3 bed ) of course if i can pay a bit less better . Faith schools ...we are catholic but not practicing and i wont do the fake show just to get a letter from a priest... so only baptize certificate ... if we manage to move by feb we might be late applicants but less late than july if makes sense ...