renting another place to get school of choice-urban myth or not?

[1dilemma]

So I was talking to a friend the other day and we were discussing this. She basically said it was an extremely rare thing to do and an urban myth, which got me thinking I only know of people who have done this by reputation not friends or family. So I thought I'd ask those who know....
so come on do people rent another place to get into the school of their choice or don't they? Friend said using another family members address was much more common.
Am in London FWIW

From Bromley's admissions docs for secondary:

"You must supply all the following documents:
To prove you are no longer connected with the old address:

Closure of Council Tax and Final utility bill (gas, water or electricity) and Solicitors? documents confirming the sale of the property or termination of your tenancy if you were renting the property

and

To prove your new address:
Current Bromley Council Tax bill and Latest utility bill or ?welcome letter? (gas, water or electricity) and Solicitors? documents confirming completion of the purchase of the property and Proof of Parental Responsibility (letter from the Child Benefit Office of HMRC sent to you at the new address). This must be dated within the last 12 months and confirm your child?s name."

I think we had to give proof when we accepted the place.

Our local school ejected at least one child a couple of weeks into the first term who'd been found not to live where the parents said they did. Kent's admission criteria for siblings for 2009 says

Current family association
(A brother or sister in the same school at the time of entry where the family continue to live at the same address as when the sibling was admitted ? or ? if they have moved ? live within 2 miles of the school ? or have moved to a new property that is nearer to the school than the previous property)

Suggesting that people would have to keep up the pretense for every child, rather than automatically getting in on the sibling rule.

I know someone who did it in SW London and I know of people who are renting in my local area to be in catchment for vg grammar school. However pre-credit crunch it was common to sell, rent and then buy as it was next to impossible to buy a family house in our village unless you were a cash buyer. Not sure what the position is now.

Oh it goes on all the time here in N London, especially for secondary schools, there are several family sized houses that are rented year after year to people who move in, get their first child into secondary school then move back to their own home knowing that they can get the siblings in.
To be safe you need to move in about 3-6 months before you put in the application and you have to stay until your child starts at the school, so you are looking at a 12 to 18 month rental. Most people just rent out their home at the same time, there are a few that can afford to rent a flat and keep the family home as well, but this is more unusual.

Where we live (not London) there is a problem with secondary schools - the two nearest are 1.5miles away, in opposite directions, both are very good and oversubscribed. Every year it's a real struggle for parents to get their Yr6 children into either, it only works if enough children go to the grammar or go private. The last thing I saw from the Head said something like 'parents continue to try to address the situation, either by lobbying the LA, or renting near the schools'. Obviously some of those rentals could be legit, but I'm pretty sure not all will be.

LadyLauraStandish I laughed at your post. Yes, quite why did I bother to enquire indeed. Came to my senses and hence moved to another borough.

When we lived in London, there were certainly people who rented solely to get a school place. The year ds applied for school the nearest primary school decided to put siblings from families outside of 'catchment' lower down the list than non-sibling catchment children (due to the problems caused by people renting a flat to get child 1 in, then moving back to their old house and having automatic places for subsequent siblings). Ds was 3rd on the waiting list when the first offers were made, by the end of the summer hols (after a lot of hurried rental agreements were made), he was 34th!
The school also carried out home visits to check occupancy (under the guise of 'assessing reception children's needs) and there was a big hoo-ha in the local paper about one family who had applied using a grandparents' address and who were claiming that the grandparents were the child's main carers (because both parents worked). They lost their place though.

Funnily enough, an estate agent was telling me the other day about how he gets 'floods' of parents coming in at certain times of the year wanting to rent one bedroom flats for short periods of time near a specific school in the area. Said he had a number of landlords that do really well out of it.

Happens around me all the time. Richmond borough (SW london). Quite pathetic IMHO

If there is a hoop people WILL jump through it.
I would be really worried about being caught, I certainly wouldn't tell anyone about it before or afterwards.

wow thanks all
I'm a bit shocked about the kids being removed seems tough on them I suppose it depends how long they've been there!
mimsum I think you might be near me
frogs I'm not so sure about your solution we have dcs in different places and picking them up/dropping off nearly causes a nervous breakdown, when one of us works late the whole thing collapses

personally I'm wondering whether I favour a lottery for initial places but can't decide, I wonder how it went in Brighton this year havn't heard much about it recently.

I'm also not sure how I feel about it morally surely as a parent your 'job' is to do the best for your child, we are excluded from the best schools round here by finances which is a situation I find worse quite frankly (but then I would because if affects me!)

dc1 is at school we applied (using the address where we lived) then moved genuinely no one asked to see proof that we had lived where we said we did when we applied.

I 'knew' all that visiting your dc at home to see them in their environment was to check addresses but a bit unfair on teachers IYSWIM they aren't hired as council snoops and what if people genuinly move?.... Personally I would have offered a time of 6.30 AM or 7.30 PM and said I wouldn't be taking a day of work for it!! (the snoop visit I mean)
Maybe I'll start a thread for Brighton people!

I'm really surprised that so many LEA's still operate the rule that siblings-out-of-catchment get priority over non-sibling-catchment children.

Where I live (Wokingham Borough), it's the other way round - at least definitely in my DCs' primary and secondary schools. I believe they changed the policy a few years ago to try and stop all this kind of stuff going on. Imo, it's definitely much fairer now.

I know someone who is planning to do it - I think it's crazy. She is essentially buying a place at the school because she can afford to rent in the catchment.

Yet she won't consider private educaton because it's not fair that facilities at private schools are not available to all. But she won't send her dcs to the nearest local comp because it's too rough, although she gets all embarrassed when pushed on this point and witters on and on about what a marvellous school it is while still refusing to send her dcs there.

I've heard of "Fortismere syndrome" where families move to Muswell Hill to live in the Fortismere catchemnt. Apparently loads of them split up because - usually - the dh is unhappy at being uprooted from the old house and would rather just pay to go private but the mother ain't having none of it. Anyone else heard of this? Or is that an urban myth too?

Doc having dcs in different schools is a nightmare for us a serious nervous breakdown inducing nightmare.

1dilemma - yes, I completely see where you're coming from and sympathise.

However, the rules were changed to try and prevent people renting short-term near a good school, getting their first child in, then moving miles away (perhaps to a great house near a crap school) and still getting subsequent siblings in to the great school. To me, that's not fair to families who have genuinely bought or rented long-term near their chosen school when out-of-catchment siblings were getting priority over them . (As is still the case in some areas, which surprises me).

It's obviously not ideal, but if the system wasn't abused by a minority then there wouldn't be so much of a problem.

umm I don't know what the answer is doc
here that simply perpetuates the system where 3 bedroom terreces near the 'best' school are now around 1,000,000 pounds I don't think selection by income is any better at least if you have sibling priority it allows poorer people to exercise educational choice
maybe a lottery and then sibling priority is better, (Brightonians where are you?) although had we been lotterised (!!) some of the schools round here I don't know what we could have done.

I see what you mean (from the other side of the coin, re sibling priority) - not sure what the answer is either. Any system currently in place seems to favour the better-off, which is clearly unfair.

ps - I'd also be interested in knowing how the Brighton lottery experiment went?

"the address where the child usually lives. Places cannot be offered based on a possible
future address. If parent and child move to a different address, but have not sold or given up
the tenancy of the previous home, this will not be considered to be a change of address. If you
allow your child to live with someone in a different catchment area, the child?s usual home will be
taken as your home address. Children whose parents have shared responsibility will have the
address at which the parent who is in receipt of Child Benefit used as their home address.
If you are moving into the area we need one of the following before we can consider your child
for a place at this school:
? a letter from a solicitor confirming that you have exchanged contracts to buy a property
in the area.
? a tenancy agreement confirming that you will be renting a property in the area.
? a letter from a Housing Association confirming that you will be living in the area."

This from one of my local primary schools, in Hampshire.