If you are a buyer, or a buyer and seller at the same time as you move up the ladder, one of your key considerations will be local amenities. Localism has had a comeback since the Covid crisis began, which has meant local amenities have taken on greater importance than ever as people have spent much more time on their doorstep.
But how can you know in advance, without visiting an area in person and having a scout around, what an area includes? Many people will be very interested in the local schools in a given area and how they are performing, particularly if they have kids or are just about start a family.
But, equally, things like green space, local shops and other local amenities such as transport links and cultural venues will be very important to many buyers. Plus, in the brave new world of remote working – which has seen many people working from home all of the time – buyers want to know how fast broadband speeds are in a given area.
Internet speeds have long been important, but – like garden space – it’s something that has become even more important since the start of the pandemic.
Here at Kings Group, we now have the facility to allow clients to search for local amenities and local schools when looking for property in any area specific to our offices.
This fantastic, interactive facility – an example of which the 'Edmonton page' can be seen here – can allow buyers and sellers to zone in on sold prices in, say, Edmonton, seeing how they have risen or fallen in the last 10 years. Comparisons can also be made with other nearby areas and by property type, to see which kind of property in a given area fetches the highest prices.
As well as this, you can use the tool to see in clear detail the broadband availability in the area you are looking to buy. Is superfast or ultrafast broadband available? What are the average recorded download speeds for each connection type? All this information will now be at your fingertips from our website.
In addition, the tool can highlight the transport links in the local area you are looking to buy in. Does the area have a station, or more than one? What lines are they on? Does the area have a Tube and National Rail station, or a new Crossrail station? While transport links have become less important to people as commuting has declined, good rail connections are still a big consideration for many, particularly as people start to return to the office, even if only on a flexible, part-time basis.
Additionally, many things are starting to reopen after lockdown – including theatres, restaurants, pubs and cultural venues – and people like fast, reliable transport links to take them into the centre of town and back.
The tool will provide information on the station itself, how far it is from your desired home, which networks the station is part of and will even enable you to plan a journey via Google Maps.
Schools, amenities and street view
As mentioned above, good local schools will be a key factor for many buyers, and our new facility maps out all the schools in the local area and how far they are from your house. Knowing the distance can be key to being in the right school catchment area.
The facility will show you the name of the school and whether it’s a primary or secondary. If you then click on the icon, this brings up a whole host of information about the school, from its Ofsted inspections to the total number of pupils, its religious character (if this applies), its number of pupils per teacher, its results and its anti-bullying and happiness ratings.
You can see reviews, latest results, an indicator of the school’s catchment area and whether or not the school is oversubscribed or not. It will also be clear if the school is Good, Outstanding, Requires Improvement or Inadequate.
You can even see features such as income and expenditure per pupil, to really provide the granular detail that could sway your decision on a school one way or the other.
Away from schools, the tool is also great for discovering exactly which local amenities are on offer – from churches, libraries and local attractions to healthcare, food & drink, leisure and shopping. These can be filtered accordingly with a click of the mouse to narrow your search.
By clicking on the icon of a café, restaurant or pub, you can see its name and then click on a link which immediately takes you to the Google results for that café, restaurant or bar, allowing you to see in instant fashion if it has good reviews and ratings on the likes of TripAdvisor and Facebook.
Lastly, by clicking the Street View tab, you are immediately taken to the Google Maps street view of the location you are interested in so you can have a browse around the streets.
This facility is now available when you visit the webpage of all our branches, from Bethnal Green and Hackney to Tottenham & Haringey, Walthamstow and Enfield Town. It’s hard to fully do it justice in words, but if you head to our website and visit the ‘branches section’, you will be able to have a play around for yourself and see just how interactive and full of useful information it is.
For buyers, such a facility can help to narrow and focus a search ahead of the initial virtual viewing. If a buyer knows it’s the sort of area they can live in, and meets their desires, it’s far less likely that there will be time wasted later on.
For sellers, meanwhile, the tool is a great way of ensuring that buyers are knowledgeable, motivated and fully on board with the local area before they look to make any bids. Sellers are more likely to have serious buyers if they’ve done their research beforehand, and our facility makes that research fun, easy and simple.
To find out more about how we can help you to buy or sell a home, please contact one of our branches in Essex, London or Hertfordshire today. We also offer a free and instant online valuation to give you an idea of how much your home could be worth on the current market.
