Air conditioning in Colindale
The least designated place we work, and the one where the freeholder matters far more than the council.
Air conditioning installation across London. Based in Harrow and Stanmore.
Air conditioning in Colindale
Yes, we cover Colindale. It is the one place on our patch where planning is almost never the obstacle and the building almost always is. Barnet publishes sixteen conservation areas across the whole borough and not one of them is in Colindale, so there is no heritage designation telling you where an outdoor unit can go. What there is instead is flats: at the 2021 Census, 2,906 of the 4,475 households in Colindale North and 5,566 of the 7,467 in Colindale South were in purpose built blocks. That means the first question is not the council, it is whether your lease and your freeholder or managing agent permit a unit on the external wall or the balcony, and whether the building has already fixed where they go. Ask the building before you book a survey, and if the answer is yes we will quote like any other job.
Wall mounted systems start from £1,995 fully installed, and the price does not change with the postcode.
Planning authority
London Borough of Barnet
Postcode district
NW9
Conservation areas
None in Colindale
Opportunity Area
Colindale and Burnt Oak, 250 hectares
There is no conservation area in Colindale
Barnet publishes sixteen conservation areas across the whole borough, and Colindale is not among them. The nearest designation is the Watling Estate, which Barnet describes as located at Burnt Oak, between Edgware, Mill Hill and Colindale, and which is a different place with different rules. The only Article 4 direction that reaches Colindale homes is Barnet's borough wide one, in force since 29 May 2016, requiring planning permission to change a dwellinghouse into a small house in multiple occupation. That is about how a building is used, not about what is fixed to the outside of it, so it has no bearing on an air conditioning installation.
What Colindale is now, and why that matters to you
Colindale is not a suburb that happens to have some new flats in it. It is a designated Opportunity Area, covering 250 hectares across the London Borough of Barnet and the London Borough of Brent, and it has been growing under that designation for twenty years. The Greater London Authority's own record shows it designated as an intensification area in the London Plan of 2004 and as a full Opportunity Area from 2008, with its status today described as maturing.
The numbers are worth seeing because they explain the housing. The London Plan 2021 gives Colindale and Burnt Oak an indicative capacity of 7,000 new homes and 2,000 new jobs by 2041. The GLA records 5,374 homes completed before 2019, a further 2,411 completed since, and a pipeline of 7,200 more, and notes that the completions since 2019 plus the existing pipeline would exceed the twenty two year capacity on their own.
Planning for all of it runs through the Colindale Area Action Plan, adopted in 2010, alongside Barnet's Local Plan, adopted in 2025. The transport has moved with it: a new Colindale Underground station on the Northern line opened in 2024, funded in part by contributions from the Peel Centre development, with Government Levelling Up funding announced in 2023 for the redevelopment of the existing station.
What the housing actually is
Households by accommodation type at the 2021 Census, for the two wards that cover Colindale. Set these against a Harrow or Pinner ward and the difference is the whole point of this page.
| Ward | Households | Detached | Semi-detached | Terraced | Purpose built flats |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Colindale North | 4,475 | 121 | 446 | 918 | 2,906 |
| Colindale South | 7,467 | 118 | 1,090 | 439 | 5,566 |
ONS Census 2021, table TS044, accommodation type by household, as at 21 March 2021, on the 2022 ward boundaries. Only the categories ONS publishes are shown; the remaining households are in converted or shared houses, other converted buildings, commercial buildings or temporary structures. Thousands of homes have completed in Colindale since that date, so the balance is if anything further towards flats now.
Why the building decides, not the council
In a purpose built block, three things sit between you and an installation, and none of them is a planning officer. The first is the lease: most leases require the freeholder's written consent before anything is fixed to an external wall, put on a balcony or passed through the building fabric. The second is the managing agent, who in many newer blocks has already decided where units may go, or that they may not go anywhere. The third is the permitted development limit itself, which for an outdoor unit on a block of flats is tighter than on a house.
None of that is a reason to give up, and plenty of Colindale flats have systems fitted. It is a reason to ask first. Getting written consent takes longer than the installation does, so the sequence that works is: ask the building, get it in writing, then book the survey.
Two practical consequences follow from the height. Above the first floor there is usually nothing for condensate to fall towards, so a pump is likely, and it is a priced line on the quote rather than a surprise on the day. And above the second floor the outdoor unit position needs access equipment, which decides whether the job is one visit or two. We say which before you agree the price.
What applies to you
You own a leasehold flat
Freeholder's written consent first, then us. Ask specifically whether external units are permitted, whether the building has a designated position for them, and whether the balcony counts as demised to you. Planning permission is very unlikely to be needed on top.
You rent in a managed block
The operator decides, and in some buildings the answer is no. We would rather tell you that now than survey a flat that was never going to be possible. If they permit it, we will quote like any other job.
You own a house in Colindale
There are more of them than the reputation suggests: over 1,400 in Colindale North and over 1,600 in Colindale South at the last Census. With no conservation area to work around, a standard wall mounted install is permitted development subject to the national limits. Condenser on a side or rear elevation, pipe run inside three metres, one visit.
You are a business
Different rules. Permitted development for air source heat pumps covers dwellinghouses and blocks of flats, not commercial premises, so an application to Barnet is likely. Our commercial page covers how we handle those, and we will give you the unit dimensions and position for the form.
Checking your own address
Barnet publishes its conservation areas and its Article 4 directions on its own planning pages, and for a Colindale address the answer will almost certainly be that neither applies to your installation. That is genuinely good news and it is the opposite of what we have to tell people in Stanmore or Pinner.
The check that actually matters here is the one we cannot do for you. Your building's own rules are held by the freeholder or the managing agent, not by the council, and they are the ones that decide. Tell us what they say and we will design to it.
Your planning authority is London Borough of Barnet
They decide any application for your address, and they publish the conservation area maps you would need to check it. We do not submit applications on your behalf, but we will tell you at the survey if one is likely and give you the unit dimensions and position to put on the form.
London Borough of Barnet conservation areasWhat we fit most in Colindale
Every price is fully installed and includes the unit, the installation, the electrical work and VAT.
Nearby
We work right across London. These are the places next to Colindale that we are asked about most.
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Instant estimate
Got consent from the building?
Then it is a normal install and the starting price is the same as anywhere else. Size your room in about a minute and we will give you a figure to take back to them.