Is Southend on Sea, Essex a nice place to live?

Is Southend on Sea a nice place to live or is Southend on Sea rough? Forget local estate agents sales speil and local councillors who say that Southend on Sea 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 Southend on Sea truly a nice place to live, or are Rochford, Southchurch and Westcliff on Sea a lot better? Time to find out.

What are the crime levels like in Southend on Sea?

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 Southend on Sea. 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
Southend-on-Sea 276
Southchurch 126
North Shoebury 73
Bournes Green 66
Stonebridge 22
Ashingdon 19
Hockley 14
Great Stambridge 2
Ballards Gore 1
Canewdon 0

The English Indices of Deprivation also has crime statistics for Southend on Sea. 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 Southend on Sea 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 Hawkwell West ward.

Ward Average rank in England
Hawkwell West (Best) 26700/32845
Hawkwell East 24728/32845
Blenheim Park 18021/32845
St Laurence 15881/32845
Roche North and Rural 14147/32845
Westborough 13675/32845
Prittlewell 13131/32845
St. Luke's 11498/32845
Roche South 10862/32845
Victoria (Worst) 5458/32845
Reader Opinion:

Southend-on-sea: Face to face with the missing link

Your Health in Southend on Sea

If you are thinking of moving to Southend on Sea, 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 Southend on Sea compares to its neighbouring local authorities. People were asked to rate their current health from very bad to very good;

Town Very Bad Bad
Southend-on-Sea 1.26% 4.48%
Castle Point 1.26% 4.4%
Rochford (Southend on Sea) 0.94% 3.38%
Maldon 1.08% 3.67%

The English Indices of Deprivation also has health statistics for Southend on Sea. 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 Southend on Sea. The table below shows ten wards in this area, from the best to the worst;

Ward Average rank in England
Hawkwell West (Best) 30061/32845
Hawkwell East 27334/32845
Roche North and Rural 21656/32845
Roche South 20882/32845
Prittlewell 17259/32845
St Laurence 16615/32845
St. Luke's 15349/32845
Blenheim Park 15007/32845
Westborough 12635/32845
Victoria (Worst) 6820/32845
Reader Opinion:

Rochford a.k.a Lesser Southend

Deprivation in Southend on Sea

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 Southend on Sea. 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
Hawkwell West (Best) 28004/32845
Hawkwell East 25082/32845
Prittlewell 18276/32845
Blenheim Park 16546/32845
Roche North and Rural 16018/32845
Roche South 15324/32845
St Laurence 14498/32845
St. Luke's 11998/32845
Westborough 11972/32845
Victoria (Worst) 5097/32845

Average rent in Southend on Sea

Every six months the Office for National statitics publishes a snapshot of rental costs. These statistics for Southend on Sea 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 Southend on Sea.

Weekly Gross Pay and Hourly Pay in Southend on Sea

If you are thinking of moving to Southend on Sea, 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?