Is Erith, London a nice place to live?

Is Erith a nice place to live or is Erith a bit rough? For us there are a number of factors that make any town a nice place to live, like a low crime rate, low levels of deprivation, the good health of the residents, rent affordability and excellent wages. In this article we will see if Erith meets our criteria.

How likely are you to a victim of crime in Erith?

The English Indices of Deprivation has a crime element for Erith. 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. Naturally rural areas have less crime than urban areas, but for this part of our town assessment we've looked at the 9 wards nearest to the centre of Erith. To pass this section, 7 out of 9 of these wards need to be above the English national average rank of 16422.5

#	Ward	Crime Rank
1	Barnehurst	17392
2	Northumberland Heath	15525
3	Crayford	15070
4	Heath	14968
5	Thamesmead East	12931
6	Belvedere	12626
7	Slade Green & Northend	10436
8	Erith	10283
9	West Hill	9902

Is Erith a healthy place to live?

If you are thinking of moving to Erith, you want to know if the place is likely to put you on a downward spiral of ill health. For this section of the town assessment, we've examined government health statistics from the 2021 Census General Health question and the Indices of Multiple Deprivation's health element.The table below shows what percentage of Erith residents answered saying their health was either bad or very bad. To pass this section, the local authority has to have a percentage score less than or equal to 7%.

Local Authority	%
Dartford	3.76
Bexley (Erith)	4.33
Greenwich	4.6
Barking and Dagenham	4.87

The English Indices of Deprivation also has health statistics for Erith. 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 LSOA rank for 9 wards nearest to the centre of Erith. To pass this section, 7 out of 9 of these wards need to be above the English national average rank of 16422.5.

#	Ward	Health Rank
1	Heath (Best)	25669
2	West Hill	22694
3	Barnehurst	21378
4	Crayford	21220
5	Northumberland Heath	21173
6	Belvedere	21079
7	Thamesmead East	19955
8	Erith	17676
9	Slade Green & Northend	14579

Is Erith rough?

Using the English Indices of Deprivation statistics, we've collated the average rank for 9 wards in and around Erith. 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. To pass this section as the town assessment, 7 out of 9 wards must have a ranking higher than the English average of 16422.5

#	Ward	Deprivation Rank
1	Heath	27252
2	West Hill	21113
3	Crayford	16272
4	Barnehurst	16213
5	Northumberland Heath	15101
6	Belvedere	12987
7	Thamesmead East	11109
8	Erith	10561
9	Slade Green & Northend	7989

How affordable are the rents in Erith?

Every six months the Office for National statitics publishes a snapshot of rental costs. These market rental statistics are dated September 2023. We have used the median rental figure for this assessment as we believe this is a more realistic figure than the average (mean) that can be skewed by artificially low and high rents. To pass this section, Erith rents for each size property have to be less than 5% more than the median rent for Outer London.

Beds	Bexley	Outer London
1	£900	£1075
2	£1150	£1300
3	£1400	£1600
4	£1800	£2100

How much can I earn in Erith per week?

If you are thinking of moving to Erith, you'll want to know how much you can earn in a job in the town. Every year the government publishes statistics on gross weekly pay, these figures are for September 2023. To pass this section Erith's local authority needs to be in first or second place compared to the three nearest local authorities.

#	Local Authority	Median Pw
1	Greenwich	£805.20
2	Bexley (Erith)	£789.80
3	Dartford	£753.00
4	Barking and Dagenham	£674.50

So, is Erith a nice place to live?

Erith has passed our core town assesment with a score of 3/5.  However, Erith does more pockets of deprivation than the average town.  However, Erith does have a number of wards were crime is worse than the national average.

* Probably.