Choose the report for the Streatham decision
Choose according to construction, alterations, condition and the purpose of your instruction.
- RICS Level 2 Home Survey — a conventional home in reasonable condition, without significant complexity.
- RICS Level 3 Building Survey — an older, altered, unusual or complex home needing a fuller investigation of condition.
- Specific defect investigation — a defined concern such as damp, cracking or water ingress.
- Pre-acquisition commercial building survey — condition and technical risk for a commercial purchase or lease.
Send the address, plans and your concerns so the proposed service, inspection limits and fee can be confirmed before instruction.
Common-side evidence: different house groups along the slope
Lambeth’s April 2017 Streatham Common appraisal describes mainly detached and semi-detached late-nineteenth-century houses on the North side, followed beyond Valley Hill Road by lower, more closely grouped interwar development. Its Southside account identifies wider and deeper plots, with mainly Edwardian and interwar houses alongside a smaller earlier group. These passages concern Lambeth’s Common conservation setting.
Identify the actual side, house and project history in the enquiry. The street comparison can organise questions about levels, roofs and additions, while the current plans establish the particular building and accommodation being bought.
Streatham building stock and property types
Streatham’s housing runs from suburban Victorian villas and large period houses to interwar mansion blocks and suburban estates — much of it older, altered or held in whole blocks, which is why Level 3 is so often right here.
Large, well-designed late-19th-century upper-class houses on the north side of Leigham Court Road, set in spacious mature gardens — substantial solid-wall stock where heritage detailing makes repairs costly.
Late-Victorian and Edwardian retail and commercial frontages, churches and residential mansion blocks along the High Road, and interwar mansion blocks and flats along the A23 at Streatham Hill (SW2), with communal flat roofs, parapets and cast-iron rainwater goods.
Low-density 1880s Queen Anne housing continuing into interwar suburban houses around Streatham Park and Garrads Road, overlooking Tooting Bec Common on the Lambeth and Wandsworth boundary, with early cavity walls and occasional non-traditional construction.
Conservation areas, listed buildings and alteration risk
Substantial parts of Streatham fall within Lambeth conservation areas, among them the Streatham Common Conservation Area, the Streatham High Road and Streatham Hill Conservation Area, the Telford Park Conservation Area, the Leigham Court Road North and Leigham Court Road South Conservation Areas, the Leigham Court Estate Conservation Area, the Streatham Park and Garrads Road Conservation Area — which straddles the Wandsworth boundary — and the Streatham Lodge Conservation Area. Streatham sits mostly within the London Borough of Lambeth, which is normally the authority for planning, conservation and any listed building consent, though the SW16 district straddles Lambeth, Croydon, Wandsworth and a small part of Merton, so confirm the council and conservation area by postcode. For a Common-side Streatham home, show changes to the roof, side range or added rooms on their own dated drawings.
On the Telford Park, Leigham Court and Streatham Common streets, roof form and visible rear or side alterations are particularly sensitive, so unconsented works — a mansard, a dormer, a replacement window or an elevational change — can carry a retrospective-consent and enforcement risk a purchaser inherits. Because the Streatham Park and Garrads Road Conservation Area straddles the Lambeth and Wandsworth boundary, the responsible council can differ street by street. Identify the responsible council at the property address and request the applicable decisions for each visible alteration rather than inferring them from the wider SW16 setting.
For a Streatham Common-side purchase, state which side and position of the Common the home occupies and identify its plot and entrance levels. Distinguish the principal house from later accommodation at the back or within the roof. Include the current layout, alteration sequence and access relevant to the bought rooms.
Relate a rising plot to the house and added rooms
For a Common-side Streatham house, request a section showing the pavement, entrance, main floors and rear garden levels. Put any lower room, side access and retaining structure on that drawing. A photograph looking across the Common can leave the relationship between the back of the house and rising land unclear.
Locate a reported moisture or movement concern at its named room or wall. Request the work description for any previous drainage, retaining-wall or lower-room treatment. Separate those documents by component and date, and identify the outside access that is available for each part of the proposed scope.
Distinguish a house group’s roofline from later roof rooms
If a Streatham house contains accommodation added within the roof, show its stairs, dormers and connections to the covering on a section. Ask for the project drawings and the associated completion documents that the seller holds. A similar roofline along the road does not explain this building’s internal alteration.
Identify the roof face named in each repair account and whether a void can be entered from the purchased rooms. Where the instruction concerns a converted floor, mark the common stair and covering that serve it. Keep the appraisal’s account of house groups separate from the present roof-work chronology at this address.
Keep a deeper Southside plot’s structures in the brief
For a house on a larger Common-side plot, distinguish the principal building, rear range and independent garden accommodation on the seller’s site plan. State which structures are part of the purchase and intended survey. Label later links, changed entrances and the route to each outside elevation.
Collect the repair file by structure rather than treating a general renovation description as one project. If a seller reports a past leak or crack, show its position and investigation date. Ask which inaccessible room, roof area or garden face needs another arrangement, leaving the proposed scope clear about the practical limits of access.
Streatham building survey questions
Does the Common appraisal describe a uniform Streatham street?
The 2017 account distinguishes North-side house groups and the wider Southside plots. Establish the particular building and side through its address and current drawings.
What helps with rooms beside a sloping garden?
A section should connect the pavement, entrance, purchased floors and rear levels. Put past treatment or drainage records against the room or retaining structure concerned.
Does a matching roofline explain a loft conversion?
Use the property’s stair and roof drawings, completion papers and dated repair history. State the voids and common parts accessible from the bought accommodation.
How should a garden building appear in the enquiry?
Locate it separately on the site plan with its work records, entrances and any later links to the main house. Identify the structures included in the proposed instruction.
Streatham Building Survey Quote & Fee Estimator (From £550 plus VAT)
Content updated: October 2026.