Moving with small children - Walthamstow, Leytonstone, Finchley or Barnet

[Rklplusthree]

Hi all,

I currently live in Finsbury park - my son is aged 2 and we have another along the way. We are in a flat and it is getting too small. I want to move in time to apply to primary school but am at a bit of a loss. A lot of my friends have moved to the Walthamstow/Leytonstone area but house prices are now incredibly high and I feel like the primaries may be very hard to get into. My family is in Finchley and I know their preference is for us to move to Finchley/ Barnet - but again, I think the schools may be hard to get into and I'm worried it may be a bit boring!! We don't really know anyone around there at all, but moving into a slightly less busy area does appeal... any thoughts or recommendations welcome!

So I think you actually get pretty decent value for money around here in comparison to other areas. And it's actually not that much further out, at Finsbury park you walk across the platform to Victoria line so it's basically as if you are on two lines. We're getting the new trains soon too which should speed things up. There's loads of young families, great nurseries and great primaries. Near Ally Pally and Muswell Hill. And generally just a nice community vibe and feels pretty safe. A guardian article recently said it was one of the happiest places to live in the UK, I feel like that's pushing it 🤣 but we are happy here and everyone else who has moved here seems to feel the same way

@Rklplusthree the transport is great! Good to hear it's got a community feel too as I wasn't sure it did when looking around.

The big drawback is its lacking any nice trendy coffee places, bakeries and a few nice pubs/ restaurants. ( Looks like there's one nice pub). But maybe I'm asking too much!

Obviously muswell Hill is not far. I think leytonstone has a few more bits like that on it's doorsteps though which appeals.

Yeah so coming from Highbury/ Finsbury park, all these were our concern too 🤣but the coffee at Hot Milk is great as is by the train station. Then Holtwhites on the edge of Broomfield Park and Astrid near Tambo Rec also do incredible croissants, bread and also great coffee, easily rivalling Finks in Highbury (if you know it). Pubs - Ranleagh is nice with a great outdoor area, but there are others closer to Wood Green too. There's definitely more choice in Highbury/ FP, but it does exist here too!

We're in BG too and its a lot of young families - theres so many nurseries and primary schools! For us we ended up moving here for the community feel - its very neighbourly and welcoming and feels very safe - there's lots of book nooks, local initiatives and a monthly farmers market. I would say the main two trade offs after a year in the area I can think of are a) choices on restaurants and gyms/studios etc. they definitely exist and are really nice but there is less choice than living more centrally - but the you become a regular so that can also be nice! b) without a car certain parts of London are trickier to get to than birds eye view would suggest e.g. Walthamstow / Leytonstone, Hampstead and less surprisingly, South London which is over an hour. On the whole though you can get very spacious victorian/edwardian housing, the transport connections are great and its very friendly

What’s the secondary situation like?

I wouldn't worry about primary schools being hard to get in to. The birth rate in London is plummeting and most schools struggle to fill their reception places. I don't know the numbers for the boroughs you are looking at, but my borough has seen a 20% fall in the number of primary school children since 2020.

@Snugbug123 love this thank you! Any restaurant recs? I hope more things might pop up as more families move to area. It definitely needs a Pilates studio!