Guides · South & West London
The questions that come before the building work
Six guides, written the way a good site manager explains something on a doorstep: the actual rule, the exception that catches people out, and what it means for the house in front of you.
Why these exist
Almost nobody rings a builder the week they first think about extending. There is a long stretch before that — sometimes the better part of a year — spent working out whether the thing is even possible, what has to be agreed with whom, and whether the answers you are getting online apply to your house or somebody else's.
These guides are written for that stretch. Each one answers a question we are asked in person most weeks: whether you need planning permission or already have it, what decides if a loft will work, why the neighbours have to be notified and what happens when they are, what changes when the property is a flat rather than a house, and how to tell whether two quotes are describing the same job.
They are not sales documents with a rule bolted on. If the honest answer to a question is that the work is a poor idea for your property, the guide says so.
What they settle, and what they do not
Everything here applies to England, and is current as written. Householder permitted development is amended every few years, and Article 4 directions — which withdraw those rights street by street — vary between boroughs and sometimes within them. Conservation areas, listed buildings and the covenants on your title can all change the answer. Each guide carries a short note saying when it was last reviewed.
So treat them as the shape of the problem rather than a ruling on your property. They will tell you which questions matter, in what order, and which of them can be answered with a tape measure before anyone is paid to draw anything. The definitive answer for your address comes from your borough's planning department, your title deeds and, where the structure is in question, a survey.
The six guides are below. If yours is not among them, ask us directly — the list grows out of what people actually ring about.
Permitted development or planning permission?Most homeowners are asking one of two very different questions when they ask this. Permitted development answers only one of them.Side return extensions: what the rules actually sayThe most reliable improvement available to a London terrace, and the project where the rules are least intuitive.What actually decides whether a loft conversion worksAlmost every London loft can be converted. The question is what it costs in money, in headroom and in the room below the stairs.Party wall awards, explained without the jargonThe single most common cause of a delayed start date on a London extension — because the notice periods are fixed by statute.Extending a ground floor flatOne of the best extension opportunities in London, and one of the least attempted — because the process has a layer that houses do not.How to read a builder’s quoteThree quotes almost never describe the same job, which is why comparing the totals tells you almost nothing.
When reading has taken you as far as it can
A guide can tell you what the rule is. It cannot tell you what your roof is made of, where the drains run or whether the wall you want to open is holding something up. That is what the survey is for.
It is free, it comes with no obligation, and you will get a straight answer about what your property will physically take — including if the answer is that the work you have been reading about is not the right one.
