“But we’re not on the local list”: unlisted buildings and the 2026 NPPF

“But we’re not on the local list.” It is usually said with some surprise, a few weeks into an application, when the conservation officer’s comments have arrived and a building nobody had treated as a heritage matter is being called a non-designated heritage asset. The objection is a reasonable one. It is also, most of the time, beside the point, and the easiest way to see why is to follow a case through.

A typical case

The example below is a composite, drawn from the kind of case we are asked to advise on.

A developer buys a detached house of about 1890 on a wide plot at the edge of a town. It is a decent, ordinary house of its date: red brick, two bay windows, a slate roof, most of its original joinery, a later garage to one side. The searches come back clean. The house is not listed, it is not in a conservation area, and the council’s local list does not mention it. The developer applies for planning permission to demolish it and build four houses.

Six weeks later the conservation officer responds. The house, the officer says, is a non-designated heritage asset. It was one of the first to be built on the road, it survives largely unaltered, and it makes a positive contribution to the street. Demolition would mean the total loss of its significance, and the officer objects.

We have used a house, but the same would apply to a shop, a chapel, a pub or a barn.

Can the council call it a non-designated heritage asset?

It can. The Framework’s glossary defines a heritage asset as a building or place identified as having a degree of significance meriting consideration in planning decisions, and says this includes, but is not limited to, assets identified by the council through local listing. The local list is a record of what a council has already identified. It has never been a boundary around what the council may identify when an application arrives, and Historic England’s advice note on local heritage listing, reissued in May 2026, says the same.

Most buildings missing from a local list are missing because nobody has assessed them, not because somebody looked and found nothing of interest. Many lists are decades old, and some councils have never had one.

That does not make the officer’s word final. Identification is supposed to rest on evidence of heritage interest, and it is fair to ask whether there is enough of it here. Age alone is not significance, and a pleasant house of 1890 is one of a great many. The owner is entitled to test the officer’s reasons and to answer them with evidence of their own, and a good deal turns on how well that is done.

How it would be decided, then and now

Under the December 2024 Framework the question was a loose one. The effect on the house was to be taken into account and a balanced judgement made, having regard to the scale of the loss and the significance of the building. The loss went into the mix with everything else, four new homes included.

The Framework published on 17 August 2026 is more exact. Policy HE7 sets out three positions for a non-designated heritage asset. A proposal with a positive effect should be supported. A proposal that causes harm is weighed against its benefits, with a balanced judgement made much as before. And a proposal that would cause substantial harm, or the total loss of the asset’s significance, should only be supported where the benefits outweigh that loss.

If the house is accepted as a heritage asset, our developer is in the third position, because demolition is total loss by any reading. The question is no longer what the balance looks like in the round. It is whether the benefits of four houses outweigh the loss of the one, and it is for the applicant to show that they do.

The test is still lighter than the one for a listed building. HE7 speaks of benefits, not public benefits. The substantial weight given to the conservation of listed buildings does not apply, and there is no statutory duty standing behind the policy. The balance scales with the significance of the building, so an ordinary house of modest interest weighs lightly, and four homes weigh a good deal.

The first position is worth a look as well. A scheme that kept the house and built behind or beside it would not merely avoid the objection. If it improved the building, it would have the express support of national policy.

What can be done without a planning application

Being identified as a heritage asset takes away no permitted development rights. Only an Article 4 direction does that. HE7 comes into play when a planning application has to be decided, so works that need no application sit outside it altogether.

That can include demolition. Outside a conservation area, the demolition of an unlisted building does not always need a full planning application, and where it does not, the heritage interest of the building is not what the council is being asked to decide.

It is not a certain route, and we have seen it go both ways. In one case we advised on, the demolition was approved. In another, the council responded with an Article 4 direction on that one building. The right fell away, and the building became a matter for a planning application after all. Which way it goes depends on the building, the council and how the matter is approached, and it is the point at which early advice earns its fee.

Two other cautions apply. Rights may have been removed by a condition on an earlier permission. And in a conservation area none of this is available: demolition needs planning permission, and the stronger tests for designated heritage assets govern.

Getting the order right

None of this needed to come as a surprise six weeks into the application. The house, its date and its condition were all there to be assessed before the purchase.

The first step is to establish what the building is, from its fabric and from the records, before the scheme is fixed. That assessment may find that the house has real interest, in which case the sensible scheme is one designed around it. It may find that it has very little, in which case the application should say so, with the evidence, in a proportionate Heritage Impact Assessment, which is the document the Framework now names for the purpose. Either way, it shows which of the available routes is worth pursuing, and in what order.

What does not work is leaving the question to be raised by the council. By then the scheme is drawn, the money is spent, and the heritage argument is being made in reply to an objection.

Questions and answers

We are not on the local list. Does heritage policy still apply?

It may. The local list shows what the council has already identified, but a council can identify a building as a non-designated heritage asset at any point, including while it is considering your application. It should have evidence for doing so, and you can respond with your own.

Can I still use permitted development rights?

Yes, unless the council has made an Article 4 direction or an earlier permission removed them by condition. Being locally listed, or identified as a heritage asset during an application, does not by itself remove any rights.

Can I demolish an unlisted building without planning permission?

Sometimes. Outside a conservation area the demolition of an unlisted building does not always need a full planning application, but the route has conditions and risks, including the council’s power to make an Article 4 direction. Take advice before relying on it.

Does the new policy stop an unlisted building being demolished?

No. Where demolition forms part of a planning application, it sets the test: the proposal should only be supported where its benefits outweigh the loss, having regard to the significance of the building.

Do I need a Heritage Impact Assessment for an unlisted building?

If the building is a heritage asset and the proposal would affect its significance, yes. It should be proportionate, so it will usually be shorter than one prepared for a listed building.

How we can help

Heritage Unlimited prepares Heritage Impact Assessments for listed, locally listed and unlisted historic buildings, and advises before purchase or at pre-application stage on whether a building is likely to be treated as a heritage asset and where its significance lies.

If you are buying, altering or redeveloping an older building and are not sure where it stands, we are happy to talk it through. If a building has real interest, or a scheme looks likely to struggle on heritage grounds, we will say so and say why.

Get in touch or call 0330 0880 984.

Header photo: David Walker on Unsplash. The photograph is illustrative and does not show a building we have advised on.