Living in Brighton: area guide to homes, schools and transport

A survey by Lloyds Bank found that the BN3 Hove postcode topped the UK popularity poll among young professional home buyers last year. And despite recent months of delays, cancellations and a reduced timetable on trains amid staff shortages and strike action by the RMT union, this year the city’s estate agents continue to report strong demand from Londoners.

Fifteen per cent of all Brighton and Hove home buyers are coming from the capital, while in the fashionable central Hove area, Hamptons International says an astonishing 55 per cent of its buyers are making the journey down the M23 to the sea.

Estate agent Edward Foster, at Hamptons, isn’t surprised. “Families are coming here for the sea, the buzzy metropolitan lifestyle, cheaper property prices and until the recent train strike, a relatively easy commute to London.”

From the independent shops of North Laine to the cultural highs of the annual Brighton Festival, to the colourful Pride celebration weekend in August, to a growing foodie scene, Brighton — a uniquely creative place — can now add the British Airways i360 to its tally of attractions.

Nicknamed the “doughnut”, this vertical cable car, the tallest moving observational tower in the world, opened this month and was designed by Marks Barfield, the architectural practice responsible for the London Eye.

Sitting on the seafront in front of the ruins of the West Pier, its 532ft steel tower is three times as tall as Nelson’s Column and the ride in its glass pod takes 20 minutes during the day and 30 minutes in the evening. It offers 360-degree views of the surrounding city, the south coast and the South Downs National Park, in an experience described as a “walk on air”.

Property scene
Regency Brighton is concentrated along and back from the seafront with a mixture of grand squares where most of the buildings have been divided into spacious flats, and smaller terrace houses. Hove has a blend of Regency and Victorian houses. The rest of Brighton is dominated by streets of simple Victorian terraces, although in the Tongdean and Withdean areas there are large detached Twenties houses.

What's new?

In Factory Mews in Arundel Place, Kemp Town, a three- to four-bedroom house is for sale for £799,500, while at Azure on the cliff top at Marine Drive, Rottingdean, a three-bedroom flat at £940,000 and a two-bedroom penthouse for £1.1 million are on the market. At 191 Kingsway in Hove there is a three-bedroom penthouse for £1.5 million, and at Innings House overlooking the Sussex County Cricket Club ground in Palmeira Avenue there is a three-bedroom penthouse for £995,000. All of these properties are on the market with Mishon Mackay and are move-in ready. Call 01273 829300.

The same agent is also selling off-plan, for completion next summer, Aquavista in Marine Drive, Rottingdean. This is a development of seven one- and two-bedroom flats and two four-bedroom houses, with the two-bedroom flats priced from £580,000 and the houses at £765,000.

Nash Watson has one four-bedroom house left at Connaught Mews in Melbourne Street in the Lewes Road area of Brighton at £475,000. Call 01273 733500.

Parq opposite Preston Park in Brighton is a development of one-, two- and three-bedroom flats and a penthouse from developer Cross Stone. Two-bedroom flats start at £430,000 and three-bedroom flats at £585,000. Call Oakley on 01273 688882.

Brighton’s largest development is Brighton Marina Village on the eastern edge of town, with 853 one- and two-bedroom flats in 11 buildings ranging from six storeys, including a signature 40-storey tower. The first phase of 175 flats is now complete and residents are moving in — 25 flats remain and prices start at £487,000 for a two-bedroom home.

Call 01273 921167, or Leaders on 01273 622007. The signature tower is being built but no launch date for off-plan sales has been announced.

London developer First Base with housing association Hyde Housing Group has recently submitted a planning application for the long-derelict Anston House overlooking Preston Park. The plan is for 230 new homes and spaces for start-up businesses, and the architect is Conran and Partners.

Hyde New Homes has shared-ownership apartments available at the Super B development in New England Square next to Brighton station. Prices start at £115,500 for a 30 per cent share of a two-bedroom flat with a market price of £385,000. Call 0345 606 1221.

The Government’s Help to Buy scheme is available at Oldbury Row in Dudley Road in the Hollingdean area of Brighton. Five of seven terrace houses are available now, and prices start at £465,000. Call Beaumont on 01273 550881.

Taylor Wimpey is also offering Help to Buy at its Shoreham Crescent development of the former Southlands Hospital site in Upper Shoreham Road, along the coast in nearby Shoreham-by-Sea on the western side of Brighton. The development includes 106 one- and two-bedroom flats — including 32 affordable — and two-, three- and four-bedroom houses.

Prices of homes currently available start at £265,000 for a two-bedroom flat and £325,000 for a two-bedroom house. The first residents are moving in and the development completes in 2018. A show home opened last week. Call 01273 894366.

The affordable homes will be available through housing association Worthing Homes, on 01903 703108.

Renting
Nicola Brown, senior lettings manager at Hamptons, says Brighton renters cover the range, from first timers to single professionals to families.

“We get renters who want to sample Brighton before making the move here; we get house renovators who can’t face living on a building site. We even get renters from overseas. I recently rented a flat to someone moving here from Chicago.”

She says most of her landlords are accidental, often because they have young families and are off travelling before their children start school, or because they’ve been posted abroad.

Travel
Brighton is at the end of the M23 and A23 from south London. Services from Brighton station, above, have been hugely disrupted of late by industrial action and staff shortages on Southern rail, but trains to Victoria and London Bridge should take about an hour and the Thameslink to St Pancras service is a scheduled 90 minutes, stopping at Blackfriars in 76 minutes.

Hove to Victoria should take 66 minutes. Thameslink trains from Preston Park to St Pancras cut a few minutes off the times from Brighton.

Staying power
Estate agent Edward Foster of Hamptons says that when Londoners first arrive in Brighton they tend to want to settle near the sea. The two top districts for newcomers are the New Church Road area in Hove and the Clifton Hill area, close to Brighton station. However, after four or five years their next move is usually to a house with a garden further inland, and proximity to the sea becomes less of a priority.

Postcodes
BN1 is the central Brighton postcode, although it stretches northward as far as Falmer, Patcham and Withdean. BN2 covers the eastern part of town including Kemp Town, Brighton Marina and the pretty villages of Ovingdean and Rottingdean. The BN3 postcode, which takes in Hove, is the most desirable.

Best roads
Tongdean Avenue, Withdean Road, Clifton Terrace, Montpelier Villas and first-floor flats in any of the seafront Regency squares — Brunswick Square in Hove, with its stucco painted a deep cream, is always well maintained.

Up and coming
Londoners who can’t afford Brighton are moving westward and looking at Shoreham-by-Sea and Worthing.

Shops and restaurants
Brighton’s main shopping centre is around Churchill Square where there are high street chains including branches of Debenhams, Apple, H&M and River Island. There are more upmarket chains along East Street with branches of Hobbs, Cath Kidston, Cos and Phase Eight. But most visitors to Brighton are charmed by the wealth of independent shops, cafés and restaurants in North Laine, south-east of the station, and the maze of historic alleyways that forms The Lanes, with their wide choice of jewellery shops between the seafront and North Street.

There are also shops, cafés and restaurants strung out all along Western Road in Hove and up St James’s Street in Kemp Town. Top interiors and homewares shops include Abode in Kensington Gardens, Utility in North Road, and i gigi and Rume, both in Western Road .

In recent years new restaurant openings have brought innovation to Brighton’s dining scene. Silo in Upper Gardner Street claims to be the UK’s first zero-waste restaurant, with interiors made of reclaimed materials and all waste food composted. Other newer openings include The Coal Shed in Boyce’s Street; 64 Degrees in Meeting House Lane and The Salt Room in King’s Road, on the seafront. Terre à Terre in East Street is a long-standing, award-winning vegetarian restaurant.

Open Space
Of course, Brighton has the seafront — but it has many lovely local parks, too. The largest is Preston Park, on the A23 on the way into Brighton, which has a rose garden, two popular cafés, velodrome, tennis courts, football and cricket pitches, basketball courts, bowling greens and pétanque.

Leisure and the arts
The listed Art Deco Saltdean Lido is being restored and will open again in the spring of next year. Owned by a Community Interest Company it will have two heated pools, a gym, a café and library. The Brighton Festival — which this year celebrated its 50th anniversary and had as its guest director the pioneering artist and musician Laurie Anderson — is held each year in May, showcasing art, music, dance, film, drama and literature.

The Brighton Dome multi-arts venue has three stages under one roof and offers top-name music, dance and drama. Two of its stages — the Corn Exchange and the Studio Theatre — are due to be renovated, with work starting in January. The historic Theatre Royal stages mainly pre-West End shows. The Komedia is Brighton’s leading live comedy club.

Council
Brighton & Hove (Labour is the majority party but with no overall control); Band D council tax for the 2016/2017 year is £1,627.66.

Brighton has a choice of both private and state schools. The local council places its state secondary schools into six large catchment areas. If any one of these schools is oversubscribed, the council allocates places by lottery rather than by how close the child lives to the school. This system may change from September 2018 with the council announcing new proposals this autumn.

Primary School

Most of Brighton’s state primary schools get a “good” Ofsted rating. The following are judged “outstanding”: St Luke’s CofE in Queen’s Park Rise; Downs Infants (ages five to seven) in Ditchling Road; Downs Juniors (ages seven to 11) in Rugby Road; Stanford Infants (ages five to seven) in Highcroft Villas; Hertford Infants (ages five to seven) in Hertford Road; West Hove Infants (ages five to seven) in Portland Road; and Patcham Infants (ages five to seven) in Highview Avenue South.

Comprehensive

The following state comprehensive schools are judged “good”: Dorothy Stringer (co-ed, ages 11 to 16) in Loder Road; Varndean (co-ed, ages 11 to 16) in Balfour Road; Hove Park (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Nevill Road; Blatchington Mill (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in Nevill Avenue and Patcham High (co-ed, ages 11 to 16) in Ladies Mile Road. King’s School (co-ed, ages 11 to 18) in High Street in nearby Portslade, an ecumenical Christian Free School which opened in September 2013, is rated “good”. The two schools which get the best results at GCSE are Blatchington Mill and Dorothy Stringer. The University of Brighton is opening a new 11-16 comprehensive school in the east central section of the city in September 2018.

Many of Brighton’s comprehensive schools stop at age 16 and pupils go on to Brighton, Hove and Sussex Sixth Form College (known as BHASVIC) in Dyke Road, which is judged “outstanding”, or to Varndean College in Surrenden Road which is judged “good”.

Private

Brighton College (co-ed, ages three to 18) in Eastern Road is a top private day and boarding school. Another top private option is Lancing College (co-ed, ages 13 to 18) in nearby Lancing; the school has a preparatory school (co-ed, ages three to 13) in The Droveway in Hove. Roedean (girls, ages 11 to 18) is a top girls’ boarding school, although it also takes day pupils, on the cliff top in Roedean Way.

The other private schools are: Bellerbys (co-ed, ages 13 to 18), an international school, in Billinton Way; Brighton & Hove High (girls, ages three to 18) in Montpelier Road; Windlesham (co-ed, ages three to 11) in Dyke Road; The Montessori Place (co-ed, ages one to 11) in Cromwell Road; Brighton and Hove Montessori (co-ed, ages two to 11) in Stanford Avenue; Brighton Steiner (co-ed, ages three to 16) in Roedean Road; Drive Preparatory (co-ed, ages seven to 16) in The Drive; St Christopher’s (co-ed, ages four to 13) in New Church Road; Deepdene (co-ed, ages six months to 11) also in New Church Road; and The Dharma Primary (co-ed, ages three to 11) a Buddhist school in Ladies Mile Road.