Planning applications are your earliest lead source

By the time a homeowner rings three builders for quotes, the project has usually been on the planning register for months. The application is the earliest public signal that someone has committed to an extension, a conversion or a new build: they have paid an agent, drawn up plans and put money behind the idea.

The register also tells you when to act. A new application means quotes are still ahead; a grant means the project is real and funded conversation starts now; a discharge-of-conditions application means a rival is already mobilising, or nobody is and the client is stuck. Decision alerts on the Trade plan tell you the day an application near you is granted, which is the moment worth a letter through the door.

Each application page here shows the address, what is proposed, the dates and the decision, with a link to the council's file for the drawings. Watch the patch you actually work, up to five areas on the Trade plan, and the leads arrive as one daily email instead of an afternoon on council portals. If the reference codes are new to you, the reference number guide takes two minutes.