London’s housing crisis has gone on for so long and become so severe that families are leaving the capital in high enough numbers to prompt a wave of school closures.
Only this week Southwark announced that two schools in the borough — where six primary schools have closed since 2022 — would be closing this August, while a Wandsworth primary school is set to close after just eight children joined its reception class for the next school year.
The problem is widespread throughout inner London and appears to be spreading to outer boroughs too, but there are some areas where raising a family is slightly more affordable and which are also desirable for homebuyers.
Zoopla used two measures: affordability (the ratio of the average three-bedroom house price in an area versus average local salaries) and popularity (the average number of Zoopla listing views for a typical three-bedroom home in each area) to find the top family friendly areas throughout the country.
The website also commissioned a survey of 2,000 people across the UK by Opinium in April, which found around a third (34 per cent) of people fear being priced out of their ideal family home location.
The property portal’s research identified Barking & Dagenham as the most popular affordable borough in London for families.
The outer east London borough has the lowest average house prices in the capital, with the average three-bedroom home costing £440,300, just 5.5 times average local earnings.
Meanwhile London-wide the average house price is eight times average earnings.
An earlier report from the property portal showed the average household would need to more than double its income to buy a home locally in 26 of London’s 33 boroughs.
The second most popular affordable borough in London was Bexley in south-east London, said Zoopla, with an average three-bedroom house price of £493,500, or 5.3 times average local earnings.
This was followed by Newham (average price £508,400, income to house price ratio of 6.3); Havering (average price £488,700, income to house price ratio of 5.2); and Enfield (average price £523,700, income to house price ratio of 5.8).
Glenrothes in Scotland was identified by the property website as Britain’s most popular affordable town for families.
Situated in the heart of Fife, and within commuting distance to Edinburgh, Glenrothes is nestled among beautiful landscapes.
Scotland and Wales dominated the list of the most popular towns in Zoopla’s top 10.
Richard Donnell, executive director at Zoopla, said: “The willingness of many to consider different regions or compromise on property features further highlights the adaptive strategies families are employing in today’s market.”
