Daylight and Sunlight Assessments in Waverley

Most of our Waverley work is in and around Farnham, with Godalming, Haslemere and Cranleigh following. The jobs are rarely large. They are extensions, first-floor additions and replacement houses on sloping, well-planted plots, where the neighbouring garden is long, the boundary is lined with hedges and fences, and the ground often drops or rises between one house and the next. Those details decide the results, so we model them rather than flattening them out.

Waverley Borough Council's officers often start with the 45-degree rule and the 3-metre set-back guidance for extensions near a boundary, and they will say when a fence or hedge should not be counted. A full BRE assessment gives the measured evidence behind those judgements, and where a scheme is heading to appeal it gives the inspector numbers rather than impressions. Our main daylight and sunlight assessment page explains what a report contains.

Recent daylight and sunlight assessments in Waverley

St John's Road, Farnham: measured evidence for an appeal

Extensions and alterations to a house on St John's Road had been refused, with the council citing the effect on daylight and sunlight to the neighbouring house. The architect wanted measured evidence for the appeal rather than reliance on the 45-degree rule, noting that the window in question was one of four serving an open-plan room, behind an existing fence and mature hedge. We modelled the house and the two neighbouring properties and ran the full BRE tests on the neighbouring windows, and the report went into the appeal bundle.

Upper Bourne Lane, Wrecclesham: a sloping site, a front garden and a boundary hedge taken out of the model

A self-builder was replacing and extending a house on a sloping plot, with a significant level change at the boundary with the neighbour. The council raised the neighbour's front garden as well as the rear garden and windows, and the officer said the boundary fence and hedge would not count for the 45-degree rule. We modelled the real ground levels and tested the front garden in sections across the slope. All windows and gardens met the BRE guidelines, and they met them again in a second scenario with the fence and hedge removed. The report was later extended for a further front extension.

Bishops Mead, Farnham: a first-floor addition next to a neighbour's garden

A first-floor addition to a single-storey building, where pre-application advice said a two-storey building along much of the boundary would be likely to appear overbearing to the neighbouring garden. With no aerial 3D imagery for the site, the neighbours' windows were photographed on site, with their permission. All the tested windows met the BRE guidelines, and the sloping garden was tested for sun on 21 March. That gave the design team measured evidence on light; whether a building is overbearing remains partly a design judgement, which the report does not claim to settle. The report was updated for the revised design in September 2025.

What Waverley planning officers look for

Waverley Borough Council decides applications against Local Plan Part 1: Strategic Policies and Sites (2018) and Local Plan Part 2: Site Allocations and Development Management Policies (2023). The two policies we cite most are TD1 (Townscape and Design) in Part 1 and DM5 (Safeguarding Amenity) in Part 2, which together ask development to protect neighbours from unacceptable loss of daylight, sunlight and outlook.

Several towns have neighbourhood plans that add local design policies. In Farnham, the Farnham Neighbourhood Plan policies FNP1 and FNP16 on design and residential extensions apply alongside the Local Plan, and Godalming and Farncombe, Haslemere and Cranleigh have their own. For householder work, the council's Residential Extensions SPD includes guidance on set-backs from the boundary. The technical benchmark is BRE BR 209 (2022 edition).

The documents are on the council's planning policy pages and its Local Plan page.

When you need an assessment in Waverley

• Extensions and alterations in Farnham, including Wrecclesham, Weybourne and the streets off the town centre, where gardens are long and narrow
• First-floor additions to single-storey buildings close to a neighbour's boundary
• Replacement and extended houses on sloping plots around Farnham, Haslemere and Hindhead
• Appeals where a refusal cited loss of daylight or sunlight
• Infill houses and plot subdivisions in Godalming, Cranleigh and Milford

How we work

We model your scheme and its neighbours in 3D, including real ground levels and permanent boundary planting, run the tests and share the results before the report is written. The fee is fixed and agreed up front, and the report usually takes 4–5 working days from final drawings, faster for an appeal deadline. The tests are:

• Vertical Sky Component (VSC): how much sky a neighbouring window can see
• No-Sky Line (NSL), or daylight distribution: how far daylight reaches into the room
• Annual Probable Sunlight Hours (APSH): annual and winter sunlight to windows facing within 90 degrees of south
• Sun on ground: whether at least half of a garden gets two hours of sun on 21 March

Our VSC, NSL and APSH page explains each test, and the thresholds are on our BRE guidelines page.

Frequently asked questions in Waverley

The officer says our hedge and fence won't be counted. Can the report deal with that?

Yes. Permanent planting is a legitimate part of the BRE baseline, but we can also run a scenario with the screening removed, so the officer's point is answered either way.

Does a sloping garden change the results?

It can. We model the real levels and, where a garden steps across a level change, test it in sections so the sun-on-ground result reflects the actual ground.

Should we include shadow diagrams?

Usually not on their own. They are not part of the BRE method and can invite subjective debate; the measured tests carry more weight. Closer to London, see our Kingston upon Thames page.

Get a fixed-fee quote

Send us your drawings and any pre-application advice or decision notice through our contact page, or get an instant figure from the price calculator. You can also call Nick on 01962 809155 or email nick@sunlightassessments.co.uk.