Primary places and moving house- twice!

[lking679]

Hi all,

A bit strange but my husband and I have an opportunity to rent out our London house and buy up North. Our London jobs have become very flexible about where we work. I am originally from the North and we have two young children, it would be nice to be near my sister, nephews and mum in these early years!
My gut feel is that after a few years though we'd want to come back to London, progress at work and have the city on the doorstep for our daughters. We'd then rent out Northern house and try to keep it as an investment. (Unfortunately don't have enough £ now to do that straight away, we'd have to live in it for three years or so to pay down mortgage enough to be allowed to rent it out).

Here's the problem-
If we come back say July 2025 then eldest will be starting year 3 in September 2025 and my 8 month old will be starting reception.... there is a great school literally over the road but it's very oversubscribed! Eldest might get a spot in year 3 as KS1 class size restriction lifted, but reception age daughter might go on a waiting list and in the meantime go to some horrid school miles away, and there are some bad ones.

What would you do? I have emailed the council if we can send mortgage details as proof of address but ultimately London house utilities and council tax are likely to be paid for by tenants so there's no other proof I can give.
The only thing I can think to do is pay council tax on both properties (i.e. included in the rent) and apply to the relevant local authority at the time? Not sure if this is possibly considered fraud but don't think it is if we move back to a property we own for the school year. It's not like we wouldn't.. it's an 180 mile commute otherwise!
What would you do... ? Other option is to not move up North at all but I feel like we could miss out on some nice time around family and doing something possibly beneficial in the long term with our money. And I thought moving back when my eldest starting year 3 still seems an okay age to make friends and progress okay at school?!
Thanks

You must apply from the property you are living in at the time of application; paying council tax for the renters and using that address would be fraud, and any place awarded on it could (and in London, in the catchment of a popular oversubscribed school, almost certainly would) be taken away when the LA discovered it.

The only way to use the London address would be to move back in time to use that for the reception allocation.

Similarly, I wouldn't rely on your Yr3 getting a place over PAN; schools can go over, but don't have to and generally don't like to. Living so close would put you high on waiting lists though (however, check the usual distance that places get allocated - in London, that can sometimes be only a few hundred metres)

It's more than living in -- it needs to be the child's permanent address, typically on a particular day in January and council's will investigate apparent shenanigans that looks manipulating addresses for advantage .

Moving back at least 8 months earlier is the only way to guarantee the reception priority, I think. But that will presumably disrupt DC1 more than otherwise. Any other games you can think of will risk being seen through and counting against you.

Okay thanks. Guess they'd both be in year moves then! Sigh. Would be nice to have a break from the city and to be near my family but not at the expense of ending up in some crappy primary at the top of a waiting list.

I did email the council, if we know we're moving back on a certain date and already own the property it's a bit of a strange one. What's the point in applying from a council to a school 180 miles away when you know you're moving back? If we move January 2025 for youngest primary school application then the eldest child would be an in year move for year 2. They wouldn't be able to go over 30 pupils even on appeal and she would just be waiting for someone to leave. Guess I'm stuck here :p.

Have you looked at the likely secondary school provision? Although things change they don't change that much. I would think about that more than primary to be honest. Maybe in your move back you could negotiate to each wfh half the week especially if you delay it until dc1 is a little older and thinking about secondary. Or just rent up North and rent out your London home if that means your time scales are a little more relaxed.

Do be aware though that if you are opposite a very desirable school then people might rent it with the intention of getting their child into school the same year you want to apply so it could be difficult to persuade them to leave before the applications close.

We can't rent up north as we have family pets which basically makes renting impossible, also there is very little to rent there hence I thought it might be a good investment, the houses to rent just get snapped up.
Both areas actually have 11+ and excellent grammars and I think secondary is a bad time to move.
Our other plan was a rear extension on current house but we've spent a lot on it already and we're not going to get much more back on value for further investment.
We're around husbands family but can't stand my mother in law and for some reason his sister isn't bothered (recently asked if she could leave our daughters christening early to go to a friends birthday!).

Just finishing maternity leave and obviously with covid and everything i've seen my own family twice and it's really such a shame and quite lonely.
But if the good primaries are oversubscribed and we're so close to one of them don't wish to rock the boat.

I don't really see us staying up there long term or I'd take a gamble.... I have four siblings, and all of us who went into higher education ended up leaving because we couldn't get good jobs there! My sisters only managed to head back as she's allowed to work from home now too. So we'd all be up there but still working for companies down South. Ridiculous!

Another option could be for one of you to move back to the London house in time for DC2 to apply for a Reception place, leaving the other parent and DC1 behind to finish up y2. Get DC2 on the waiting list for y3 based on moving back in July.

Obviously, you're not guaranteed DC1 getting their y3 place easily, but the YR place will be the harder one. Is there much movement of children out of the school between y2 and y3 to private preps/etc? That could work in your favour.

I think there’s a bit of movement. I wouldn’t want to split family up to be honest as it’d be from about feb-July so that’s a long time!
I did read this on government website for overseas applicants proving address and intention of moving so maybe if we provide deeds, mortgage and signed letter to local council we’re moving back July/august when we apply from the North it will be enough evidence of our local address that they can base distance criteria on it? Otherwise we’d never get into any local schools they’re all oversubscribed!
Have emailed council so will see what they say and maybe provide them this screenshot.