Block Management in Exeter
Block, estate and leasehold management for Exeter. Compliance is tracked against Exeter City Council and the county above it. Roughly 46 miles from our office.
Managing a Block in Exeter at a Glance
- Local authority
- Exeter City Council
- Authority type
- District, under the county council
- Building control
- Exeter City Council Building Control
- County
- Devon
- Fire and rescue service
- Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service
- Water and sewerage
- South West Water
- From our Plymouth office
- Approx. 46 miles by road, about an hour
- Setting
- Inland
Who You Deal with in Exeter
A block in Exeter deals with Exeter City Council for building control and planning, with the county council above it. Fire safety in the common parts is enforced by Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service. Communal water and sewerage is South West Water.
The Residential Stock in Exeter
At the 2021 Census 19.6 per cent of Exeter's 52,551 households were in a purpose-built block, above the England figure of 17.1 and more than double Devon's 9.4. The converted share, at 4.5 per cent, is well below Plymouth's or Torbay's, so the flat stock here is disproportionately purpose-built. Central Exeter is 70.3 per cent flats. Exeter is unusual among the places covered on this site in that its built-up area is effectively the whole district, 95.6 per cent of it, so the usual gap between town and administrative geography is negligible here, under a third of a percentage point on every category. Across 50,212 households, 19.9 per cent are in purpose-built blocks and 4.6 per cent in a converted or shared house. The variation that matters is between wards rather than between the city and the county. St David's ward is 50.8 per cent purpose-built flats, half of all homes in it. Duryard and St James has the highest converted or shared house share in the city at 12.5 per cent, fourteen times St Loyes, and Newtown and St Leonard's is close behind at 11.6 per cent. That is the student and shared-housing signature, and it maps onto the Article 4 boundary almost exactly.
Flood Risk in Exeter
Exeter's flood risk is fluvial, from the Exe. The Exeter Flood Defence Scheme, a partnership between the Environment Agency, Devon County Council and Exeter City Council, protects more than 3,200 homes and businesses. Devon County Council rather than the city council is the Lead Local Flood Authority, and its action plan records the October 2021 surface water event in which nine properties flooded internally, with Longbrook Street flooded to knee level. Three Environment Agency warning areas cover parts of the city and all three are genuinely contained rather than merely nearby. The River Exe at Exeter area, the largest at 888 hectares, has 45.3 per cent of its extent inside the built-up area and names low-lying parts of the city from Cowley Bridge to Topsham including St David's, Bonhay Road, Exwick, St Thomas, Marsh Barton, Alphington and Countess Wear. A second names riverside locations including St Andrew's Road, The Quay, Mill Road and Countess Wear Road, and a third names vulnerable riverside locations including Exwick Mills and the Mill on the Exe. Five further areas returned by a radius search, including the Lower Exe alert and the South Devon Estuaries alert, are near the city without being contained in it and are not cited here.
For a block that reaches leaseholders through the insurance premium and excess, and through the management pack when someone sells.
Conservation Areas and Listed Buildings in Exeter
20 conservation areas, with adopted appraisals covering Central, Southernhay and the Friars, St David's, St Leonard's, Longbrook, Pennsylvania, Riverside, Topsham and twelve more. Exeter has 20 conservation areas, and 19 of them lie inside the city's built-up area; the twentieth, Topsham, designated in March 1989, is a separate built-up area of its own and should not be listed as an in-city designation. The largest wholly within the city is St Leonards at 80.9 hectares, designated in May 1978, and the oldest core designations are Central, from June 1992, and Southernhay and The Friars, from March 1993. Nine were designated between 2004 and 2009, so most of the city's conservation area coverage is recent. The council publishes an adopted appraisal and management plan for every one of the twenty, with adoption dates that differ from designation dates, and it records that a programme to update them is under way. One practical limitation: the appraisals page carries no direct document links and directs users to a separate documents library, so unlike North Devon or Teignbridge you cannot deep-link an Exeter appraisal. Two conservation areas within two kilometres of the city are not Exeter City Council's at all, Ide belonging to Teignbridge and Sowton to East Devon.
Exeter City Council records over 1,800 listed buildings in the city, and notes that all three grades receive the same legal protection and that the protection covers the whole structure inside and out. The council states that over 1,800 listed buildings exist in Exeter. Counting entries on the National Heritage List inside the built-up area gives 762, of which 22 are Grade I and 69 Grade II*. Those two figures are not in conflict and the gap should be explained rather than smoothed over: the national list counts entries, and a single Exeter entry such as 1 to 10 Southernhay West or 13 to 24 Southernhay West covers an entire terrace. Twenty-two Grade I buildings is a very large number, including the cathedral, the Guildhall, Rougemont Castle, the Bishop's Palace and its gatehouse, Mol's Coffee House, four separate entries on Cathedral Close, St Nicholas' Priory, the Custom House and Quay House. Four Grade II entries sit outside the built-up area while inside a conservation area, all of them on or over the Exe where the boundary is cut by the river.
Consent has to precede the Section 20 specification, not follow it, or leaseholders are consulted on work that cannot lawfully be done as described.
Radon in Exeter
Exeter is materially lower-risk than most of Plymouth or Brixham. On the national map the EX1 kilometre square is in the lowest band, EX2 at 1 to 3 per cent and EX4 at 3 to 5, the last of which reaches the BR 211 basic protective measures range. Exeter is the only place covered in this deepening pass that is genuinely split across the threshold where national advice changes. Across the 80 one-kilometre squares over the built-up area, 34.7 per cent of the city by area is in the lowest band, where the published wording is that all parts of the square are in the lowest band with under 1 per cent of homes at or above the action level and the advice is that radon measurement is not advised. A further 38.4 per cent is class 2, 11.2 per cent class 3, 5.9 per cent class 4 and 9.8 per cent class 5, at 10 to 30 per cent. So a third of Exeter needs no measurement and a tenth of it is in the second-highest band, which makes the address rather than the city the right unit of analysis.
That is national advice about the ground, not about the building. The same map excludes basements, cellars and underground spaces at every band, so an enclosed plant room, undercroft or lower-ground flat is still worth a look even here, and whatever is found belongs with the compliance record.
Licensing and Permitted Development in Exeter
An Article 4 Direction in force since 2011 covers an area near the university and removes the permitted development right to change a dwellinghouse to a small house in multiple occupation there. Separately, the council notes that a building converted into self-contained flats can itself be a house in multiple occupation where the conversion did not meet the 1991 Building Regulations and fewer than two thirds of the flats are owner occupied. Exeter is the one authority covered in this deepening pass with Article 4 directions published to the national register, and it has sixteen. The one that matters most for block management is the 2023 direction, in force since 23 December 2024, which removes the permitted development right to change a house into a small house in multiple occupation, so that planning permission is now required. It covers 345.8 hectares, 11.4 per cent of the built-up area, and it replaced an earlier direction established in 2010 and updated in 2014. That predecessor named its area explicitly: the St James ward and parts of the Duryard, Newtown, Pennsylvania, Polsloe and St Davids wards, excluding specific designated streets within St James. The 2023 replacement is 54 per cent larger in area, and the council's published description of it is a single sentence without a street schedule, so the precise boundary has to be checked with the council. The other fifteen are site-specific, the oldest dating from April 1958 at the Strand in Topsham.
Two permissions get confused here. The council's requirements are public law and apply whatever the lease says; consent under the lease is private law and applies whatever the council says. A leaseholder letting a flat usually needs both.
Planning Policy That Affects Flats in Exeter
Exeter is governed by an unusually old development plan: the council describes it as made up of the core strategy adopted in 2012 and the Exeter Local Plan First Review of 2005, guiding development to 2026. A replacement, the Exeter Plan for 2021 to 2041, is in preparation. There is no made or emerging neighbourhood plan anywhere in the city, and none appears on the national register either.
Policy in an adopted plan is not guidance. It is what the application is decided against, and a consent granted under the lease does not substitute for it or vice versa.
Local Government Reorganisation in Exeter
On 16 July 2026 the Secretary of State decided to reorganise local government across Devon, Plymouth and Torbay into four unitary councils, replacing Devon County Council and its eight districts. Elections to the new councils are due in May 2027 and they are to be implemented by April 2028, through a Structural Changes Order subject to Parliamentary approval. Until then the existing county and district structure stands.
The obligations in the lease and in statute do not change. What changes is the body an application goes to and the authority that enforces housing standards, so compliance records and planning history need to be in order before the transfer rather than after it.
Changing Managing Agent in Exeter
Changing agent is the company's decision, taken the way its articles require. The only part with a deadline is the notice the outgoing agent is contractually owed. On Exeter heritage stock the consents history is what most often turns out to be incomplete, and its absence resurfaces later as a planning problem.
See the handover sequence in full, and our fees, which are a fixed annual amount with no commission on contractor work.
Going Deeper in Exeter
| Area | Local authority |
|---|---|
| Topsham | Exeter City Council |
Towns and Villages We Cover from Exeter
Pinhoe, St Leonards, Heavitree, Exwick, Alphington, Countess Wear, Cranbrook, Broadclyst.
Service charge or accounts query? Email accounts@
Exeter Questions
Which Council Does a Block in Exeter Deal With?
Exeter City Council Building Control. A district council, with the county council above it for county functions.
Who Enforces Fire Safety in the Common Parts in Exeter?
Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service, as the enforcing authority for the Fire Safety Order.
Who Supplies Water to a Development in Exeter?
South West Water. A communal supply is the building's contract, not a leaseholder's, so report a loss to common parts through us.
Is Exeter Too Far from Your Plymouth Office?
It is about 46 miles, about an hour. Distance changes how site visits are scheduled, not whether they happen.
Do We Need Consent for External Works in Exeter?
On a listed building or in a conservation area, yes, for much that would be permitted elsewhere. Get it before the Section 20 specification, not after.
Is the Council for Exeter Changing?
Yes. Reorganisation was decided in July 2026 and takes effect by April 2028. The lease obligations do not change; the authority you file with does.
Nearby Areas
Talk to Us About Your Building in Exeter.
A free, no-obligation proposal, written so it can be circulated to a board.
Exeter Block Management, Queensgate House, 48 Queen Street, Exeter, EX4 3SR
Business address for our Exeter Block Management trading name.