We currently live in an area in London we love, but it's expensive and the flat we own is tiny (1.5 bed, second DC due in Nov). There's a mix of local state primaries, some good some less so - all around 90%+ ESL (not a mix of languages, the area is almost entirely Bengali). For various financial reasons we can't sell our flat for another couple of years, end of 2018.
So we're considering renting our flat out, and moving to a neighboring, cheaper borough to a rented house (what we get in rent would cover the cost of a bigger place there, and we would actually have space to breathe!) in time for DD to apply and start school in Sept 2018. We would then sell the flat as soon as we could and attempt to buy something within the catchment of the school she gets a place at, as we'd want 2nd DC to go there too. We're certainly not looking to cheat the system - it's just our current home is far from ideal.
Would this technically be allowed in terms of admissions? Would you do the same? The alternative is to stay in the tiny flat, get DD into a local school, then move and do an in-year admission for Year 1/2 dep on timings, once we've bought in the area. Would you then attempt to rent nearest the best school you could - if you were going to rent somewhere anyway? I do also worry about the upheaval of moving school for her a year in though.
Thanks - it's driving me a bit crazy trying to work out what to do!