Asbestos Removal in Godalming

Godalming is the closest town on our list, about four miles south of Guildford down the A3100 through Farncombe, or off the A3 at the Milford junction if you are coming from the south.

That proximity changes one thing in a way it does not for anywhere else we cover, and it is worth leading with.

The one town where the tip route is realistic

Guildford Community Recycling Centre is one of just three sites in the whole of Surrey that accepts asbestos, the others being Epsom and Shepperton. For most of the towns on our list that means a long drive with a hazardous load. From Godalming it is four miles.

The rules are still tight and worth knowing before you commit. Six sheets of asbestos cement is the maximum. It has to be sprayed with water and double wrapped or double bagged in heavy duty polythene, taped, before you arrive. A van, pickup or trailer needs a van permit and the load counts against the construction and DIY waste allowance. It must not be mixed with other DIY waste. You need to phone the site first to check there is space in the container, complete a declaration on arrival, and show evidence of Surrey residency.

Six sheets will not cover a garage roof. It will cover a small shed, a coal bunker, or a couple of sheets that came off in a storm, and for those Godalming is genuinely the best placed town we work in.

Those rules change from time to time, so check the Surrey County Council page before you load anything. Where the quantity is beyond six sheets, or you would rather not handle it, our collection service covers the town.

What the housing looks like

Godalming is older than its neighbours and that shows in the pattern of what we find.

The town has Anglo-Saxon origins and the parish church of St Peter and St Paul has ninth century work in it. The Pepperpot, the little market house on the High Street, dates from 1814. The town grew substantially after the railway arrived in 1849 and Charterhouse School moved here in 1872, which produced a lot of Victorian and Edwardian housing that predates asbestos entirely.

So the main houses are frequently clear. What is not clear is everything added since. Garages built in the 1960s onto Victorian plots. Outbuildings, workshops and stores across Farncombe and Busbridge. Textured ceilings applied in the 1970s over lath and plaster that was already a century old, which is one of the commonest jobs we quote here.

The 2011 census gives the civil parish as roughly 30 per cent detached and 31 per cent semi-detached, with about a fifth flats. That balance matters because detached and semi-detached houses come with garages, and garages come with cement roofs.

The other local footnote worth knowing: Godalming was the first town in the world with a public electricity supply, in 1881. That is nearly seventy years before any of the material we deal with arrived, and it is a reminder that a town being old is not the same as a town being asbestos-free.

Getting around the town

The A3100 through Farncombe is the direct approach from Guildford. Flambard Way, built in the 1990s to take through traffic out of the centre, means the High Street area is easier than it used to be but it is still tight.

Access is the main variable on price here. The streets climbing away from the High Street are narrow, several have no parking within useful distance of a rear garden, and the older properties frequently have their garage or outbuilding at the end of a passage rather than on a drive. A shed at the bottom of a garden reached through a house is a different job from the same shed on a Burpham driveway, and that is worth mentioning when you send a photo.

The Wey, and why it matters here

Godalming sits on the River Wey with the Lammas Lands beside it, and the low ground either side of the river floods. That has a practical consequence for anyone with asbestos cement on an outbuilding down near the water.

Cement sheet that has sat in damp for decades weathers faster than the same sheet on a dry plot. The surface breaks down, moss gets in, and frost lifts the face. That is the difference between material in sound condition, which is non-licensed work and comes off in whole sheets, and material that is substantially damaged, which is notifiable non-licensed work and has to be reported to HSE before it starts.

It is not a reason to worry. It is a reason to photograph the actual condition rather than describing the roof as fine, because on the low ground here it frequently is not.

What we get called for

Garage roofs and outbuildings first, on the 1930s to 1970s housing around the edges of the town and through Farncombe.

Textured ceilings second, and the answer is frequently that sealing beats removing. A 20 square metre ceiling is £2,750 to £6,000 to strip against roughly £30 per square metre to seal, and on a sound ceiling in an occupied house the second option is usually the sensible one.

Then surveys. Godalming has a higher share of period property being refurbished than most of the towns we cover, and a refurbishment and demolition survey before a strip-out is far cheaper than finding insulating board on day one of the works.

We also cover Farncombe, Busbridge, Milford, Witley, Elstead and Chiddingfold from here. The full list is on the areas we cover page and the price ranges are on the cost page.