Yes, for most of Walton. Listed buildings are few. Three conservation areas cover the old centre, the riverside and one outlying pocket. The neighbours put in close to a thousand planning applications a year. On a post-war street the main obstacle is the house next door, and it's probably extending too.
Walton has 39 listed buildings. Two are Grade I, none is Grade II*, and the other 37 are Grade II. Listing covers the whole building, inside and out, so almost any change that affects its character needs listed building consent from Elmbridge on top of any planning permission, and that includes some internal work. With 39 in a town of this size, the odds that the house on your shortlist is one of them are low, but it's worth confirming. The town's own council offices, a modernist town hall finished in 1966, were demolished once the council that used them had been merged away, so Walton has never been sentimental about its buildings.
The three conservation areas are Walton Church Street-Bridge Street, Walton Riverside and Upper Halliford. Inside them, the council looks harder at anything visible from the street, such as extensions, roof changes, materials and demolition, and some work that would be automatic elsewhere needs an application. Search Elmbridge's planning records for the exact address and check its past applications and whether it falls inside one of the three boundaries. That boundary decides whether a dormer is a weekend job for the builder or a set of drawings for the council.
Elmbridge's records show 2,404 planning applications in Walton between April 2024 and July 2026, and 984 of them in the most recent twelve months. That is live evidence of a town that keeps altering itself, one rear extension and loft conversion at a time. Whatever you're planning, someone a few streets away has probably already drawn it.
Outside the conservation areas, and away from the listed buildings, most of Walton's semis, terraces and detached houses can use permitted development rights for modest rear extensions, loft conversions and outbuildings without a full application, within the national size limits. Flats have no permitted development rights of this kind, so anything there means a full application. Where an earlier permission or a covenant has removed those rights, a full application is needed as well. A lawful development certificate from the council is the cheap way to prove a project qualifies before the builder starts.
Walton's freedom to extend is middling. It's easy on the post-war streets and tighter around the church, the bridge and the river, where most of the town's history is kept.