Moving to Chipping Barnet/High Barnet

[yellowbusplease]

We currently live in another London borough but are in a bit of a black hole when it comes to secondary schools so looking to move. We have two DDs, one primary age and one still a toddler.

We have been researching areas and Chipping Barnet seems to be coming out on top. What can people tell me about this area? I'm wondering if we are overlooking anything important...

Our budget is approx. 850k, ideally for a four bed. I need to travel to Charing Cross for work, husband's job is more flexible. We both want to be near a tube station rather than overground if possible.

For secondary schools, we really like what we know so far about Queen Elizabeth's plus I like having other options such as Dame Alice Owen's. Any others we should be thinking about?

What should we know about primaries? Is DD1 likely to get a place if she joins in y3 or y4 or is this going to be a total headache? I'm presuming it's like our current borough where you have to live virtually on top of the school to be in catchment, is that right?

Does it generally feel like a nice, safe place to live? Would it be easy to make friends?

Just generally interested in views really! And if we like this area are there others we should be considering?

£850k for a 4 bed might be ambitious in High Barnet. Have you been up to look around?

Really? Yes we've been to look around and seen quite a few properties within that budget.

I stand corrected on the budget - sorry!
Which areas/roads are you particularly keen on?

We are not sure really, I don't think we know enough about the area yet. Obviously close to the station would be helpful for work, but the high street seemed to get nicer and nicer the further away from the station we walked...

There are a lot of nice roads around that station and the further past the main shops in High Barnet. You are looking in a v wide area.
Lovely area with plenty going on & nice countryside.
QE boys a grammar school but QE girls isn’t- both v good schools.
Dame Alice again good but hard to get into. Does offer places musical excellence & high aptitude.
Also Henrietta Barnet Girls School is very good grammar school.

New Barnet has a train line that goes into Moorgate & Kings Cross.

Thank you. I also wondered about Latymer as it seems it may be possible to apply from some postcodes in the area (possibly not all?)

What I like most about the area though is that (I think) there are good secondary options even if grammar/selective doesn't end up as an option. As it's a bit early to tell how academic the girls will be.

Any particularly good areas for primary school places? In my current area, for instance, there are roads where parents can choose between 3 different primaries and have a good chance of a place at any of them. And there are other roads where they realistically may not get a place at any of the local schools and will instead get a place at an under subscribed school at the other end of the borough...

@yellowbusplease
Barnet is lucky that the state schools are good for both primary and secondary.

In the High/Chipping Barnet area the best primaries are: Foulds, Cromer Road, Hadley Wood, St Catherine’s.

The link will you an idea of how primary places were allocated for Sept 2019 starters
admin.barnet.gov.uk/sites/default/files/primary_2019_allocation_table.pdf

For primary (and secondary) admission distances, you might want to look on the Barnet council website. There will either be an interactive tool or a booklet to download.

Presumably you’ve been using the website below, but here’s a link in case you haven’t.

www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/compare-schools?for=primary

Cross posted.