Is Swanley, Kent a nice place to live?

Is Swanley a nice place to live or is Swanley rough? Forget local estate agents sales speil and local councillors who say that Swanley is on the up an up, it's time for a bit of reality. Cold hard statistics culled from the Police, the Indices of Deprivation and the latest census. Is Swanley truly a nice place to live, or are Bexley, St Mary Cray and Dartford a lot better? Time to find out.

What are the crime levels like in Swanley?

Using the latest Police street crime figures (typically from 3 months ago) we have compiled a table of the most voilent Policing areas in and around Swanley. Naturally the more urban and more central areas will have a higher rate of crime, but often you can be surprised when that is not the case and that is the area you want to move to.
Policing Area Voilent Crimes
Hextable 63
Bowmans 30
Heath Side 16
Crockenhill 9
Hockenden 7
South Darenth 6
Ruxley 1
Farningham 0
Eynsford 0
Kevingtown 0

The English Indices of Deprivation also has crime statistics for Swanley. These statistics are published by the government every 2-3 years. They are a measure of how likely you are to be a victim of personal or material crime in an area, such as muggings or burglary. We've taken the rank average for wards in and around Swanley and compared them. The table below shows ten wards in this area, from the best to the worst.

You least likely to be a victim of crime in the Joyden's Wood ward.

Ward Average rank in England
Joyden's Wood (Best) 18507/32845
Eynsford 17924/32845
St Mary's & St James 16199/32845
Swanley Christchurch and Swanley Village 16142/32845
Hextable 13345/32845
Wilmington, Sutton-at-Hone & Hawley 11292/32845
Farningham, Horton Kirby and South Darenth 10526/32845
Maypole & Leyton Cross 9623/32845
Swanley White Oak 6215/32845
Swanley St Mary's (Worst) 2602/32845
Reader Opinion:

Bexleyheath - a hive of villainy

Your Health in Swanley

If you are thinking of moving to Swanley, you want to know if the place is likely to put you on a downward spiral of ill health. We've taken the healh question from the latest census to find out and how Swanley compares to its neighbouring local authorities. People were asked to rate their current health from very bad to very good;

Town Very Bad Bad
Greenwich 1.27% 4.09%
Bexley 1.09% 3.74%
Sevenoaks (Swanley) 0.87% 3.11%
Dartford 1.03% 3.4%

The English Indices of Deprivation also has health statistics for Swanley. They measures the risk of premature death and the impairment of quality of life through poor physical or mental health, lovely! We've collated an average rank for all the Lower Super Output Areas (LSOA) in each ward in and around Swanley. The table below shows ten wards in this area, from the best to the worst;

Ward Average rank in England
Eynsford (Best) 31745/32845
Farningham, Horton Kirby and South Darenth 27748/32845
Hextable 27624/32845
Swanley Christchurch and Swanley Village 27350/32845
Joyden's Wood 26708/32845
St Mary's & St James 23898/32845
Maypole & Leyton Cross 19880/32845
Wilmington, Sutton-at-Hone & Hawley 18504/32845
Swanley St Mary's 18468/32845
Swanley White Oak (Worst) 16759/32845
Reader Opinion:

Tilbury, a God-forsaken town of disgruntled, rancorous d*ckheads

Deprivation in Swanley

Using the English Indices of Deprivation statistics, we've collated the average Index of Multiple Deprivation rank of all the LSOAs in the wards in and around Swanley. In layman's terms, this is how rough the ward is based on mutiple measures of deprivation including; employment, income, health, crime, housing and outside space.

Ward Average rank in England
Joyden's Wood (Best) 27328/32845
Eynsford 26447/32845
Hextable 23668/32845
Swanley Christchurch and Swanley Village 23467/32845
St Mary's & St James 21762/32845
Farningham, Horton Kirby and South Darenth 21054/32845
Maypole & Leyton Cross 18468/32845
Wilmington, Sutton-at-Hone & Hawley 17097/32845
Swanley White Oak 11862/32845
Swanley St Mary's (Worst) 9009/32845

Average rent in Swanley

Every six months the Office for National statitics publishes a snapshot of rental costs. These statistics for Swanley are dated September 2021. They are split into three figures, the lower quartile, mean and upper quartile. If you recieve housing benefit or the housing benefit section of Universal Credit, the lower quartile is at the top limit of what would be affordable. The mean is the average you'd expect to pay for a rental property and the upper quartile is the average rental cost of the most expensive 25% of properties in Swanley.

Weekly Gross Pay and Hourly Pay in Swanley

If you are thinking of moving to Swanley, you'll want to know how much you can earn in a job in the town. The government publish regular statistics on gross weekly pay and pay per hour.

How grim is your Postcode?