I was having a chat with a footie-loving property investor friend the other day.  After we spent a very small amount of time discussing England’s chances of winning in the forthcoming Euro Championships (!), we got chatting about property.

He has a couple of young children and asked if schools, especially primary schools, affected the local property market in terms of demand from buyers and tenants to a property.  Anecdotally, I have always known this to be true, a good school creates good demand and good demand does affect house prices.  So, I asked my colleagues on the front line, who take the phone calls from people putting themselves on our mailing list and they confirmed that most people cite location as their number one factor.

After looking through our mailing list, it confirms there is a close correlation between the high demand areas of Walsall and the close proximity to a good primary school.  Talking to my team in a recent morning meeting, they agreed many people would look to increase their budget quite significantly, whilst others would consider downgrading their property requirements to be close to a good primary school.

Those of you who regularly read this blog will know I like a challenge, so I decided to look at the science behind these assumptions.  According to the School Guide website, St Mary’s The Mount Primary School in Highgate is one of the top primary schools in Walsall.  Its figures are certainly impressive.  Their last Ofsted Report (October 2013) classified it as ‘Outstanding’, 100% (national average 80%) of 11 year olds achieving Level 4 or above in maths, reading and writing whilst 33% (national average (24%) of them achieved level 5. There is also an excellent pupil/teacher ratio of 19:1. Finally, the schools’ KS2 rating was classed as ‘Excellent’.

Looking at property sales within half a mile of Highgate, property values have risen in value since 2001 by 111.06% whilst according to the Land Registry, the Walsall average as a whole has risen in the same time frame by 84.0%. That means the Highgate locals have seen the values of their properties rise proportionally 27.06% more than the Walsall average… interesting don’t you think?

However, whilst a good primary school significantly contributes more to house prices, the same can’t be said for secondary schools. There are two reasons for this, firstly, as secondary schools are much larger, so their catchment areas are correspondingly much larger, meaning parents don’t need to live so close to the school.  Secondly, in the UK, whilst the difference between the top 25% and bottom 25% of secondary schools is not insignificant, in the primary school sector, the difference between the top 25% and bottom 25% is, according to the London School of Economics, is considerably and significantly more.

Many other Walsall landlords, both who are with us and many who are with other  Walsall agents, like to pop in for a coffee or ring/email us to discuss the Walsall property market, to consider how Walsall compares with its closest rivals and hopefully we can answer all their questions.  You must take lots of advice and seek out the best opinion. I don’t bite, I don’t do the old “hard sell”, I will just give you my honest and straight talking opinion and furnish you with facts, like the ones above, that you probably won’t even think about!!

Phone: 01922 311016

Email: salekm@ashmorelettings.co.uk