Sevenoaks?

[Applesauce29]

Anyone know much about the town? Is there a community feel? What is the commute into the city like (do trains run on time, can you get a seat from this station)? Are the schools good; massively oversubscribed?

Trying to find somewhere we can move to with good primary schools, good commute to city and where we could get a garden. Proving to be a massive headache the way London house prices are going.

Any feedback from people who know the area much appreciated.

We thought of moving out at one point and seriously looked at Sevenoaks. I share reasons we didn't move in case it helps. For our budget (£625k) we couldn't really get much more for our money than what we already had in Petts Wood. Whilst there were fast trains from Sevenoaks we had more choices of destinations from Petts Wood and the cost of commuting was vastly different. We loved our community feel and it was an unknown for us in Sevenoaks. Although keen on the Kent Grammars, Sevenoaks doesn't yet have one close by and a lot of grammar school children commute to other Kent towns. I say yet as there is 'supposed' to be a girls grammar opening in September 2016, but it just a blank piece of land at present. Where we are we can apply to three lots of grammars so all our eggs are not in one educational basket. I start getting nervous outside the M25 for too long ;), I also like the thought of DD being independent and travelling around London which unless we lived in urban Sevenoaks wouldn't be so easy from one of the villages.

I hope someone comes along with some great info about Sevenoaks that helps more with your decision.