You can extend a house in Rustington. You will need to ask more people than you would in a village without 145 listed buildings, seven conservation areas, and two scheduled monuments. The listed buildings include four at Grade I and five at Grade II star. The conservation areas cover most of the historic village core and its neighbouring parishes. Permitted development rights exist here, but they exist in a much narrower band than a buyer used to a modern estate assumes.
The 145 listed buildings break down as four at Grade I, five at Grade II star, and 136 at Grade II. Grade I means a building of exceptional interest, which in practical terms is a building nobody in their right mind extends without a very long conversation. Grade II star means particularly important. Grade II means special interest and covers the vast majority of the count. Listing runs to the whole property, exterior and interior, and includes features you might assume are yours to change: window frames, chimney breasts, staircases, and panelling. If you own a listed building here, the work you can actually do is not always the work your architect thinks you can do. Listed building consent is a distinct process from ordinary planning permission, and both apply on top of each other.
Seven conservation areas sit within the wider Rustington area. They cover the Rustington conservation area itself, plus Ferring, Highdown, East Preston Station Road, Castle Goring, Angmering, and Poling. In a conservation area, some permitted development rights are curtailed by default. You may need consent for work that would be unregulated in a standard postcode: certain cladding, roof coverings, window changes, satellite dishes, and boundary walls. The rules are strict on the fabric of the streetscape because the streetscape is the point. Councils can further tighten these rules through specific directions on named streets, and the first thing to check with any address is which directions apply.
Practically, this splits addresses in Rustington into three buckets. First: modern non-listed houses on non-conservation streets, where permitted development covers a fair amount of what buyers actually want to do, including rear extensions within limits, loft conversions, and hard landscaping. Second: non-listed houses inside a conservation area, where permitted development is narrower and each visible change gets tested against the conservation area's character. Third: listed buildings, where nearly every change of substance needs listed building consent alongside standard planning permission. The bucket the property sits in matters more than the property itself. Check the listed-buildings register and the conservation-area map for the specific address before making any offer that assumes you can extend, convert, or swap the windows for something the previous owner would have envied.
Two out of five on the freedom to alter or extend a home, which is a low mark for a village with 145 listed buildings to protect. Buy a listed building here if you want the building. Do not buy one if the plan is the extension.