"My house has become worthless overnight"
Residents in a Surrey village have told us they are distraught following the unauthorised development that has taken over the area
Last updated 10th Apr 2026
Last Friday morning (April 3) residents in Alford were woken at 7 in the morning to a convoy of trucks starting an unauthorised development on land just opposite their houses.
Alford is a small village on the Surrey-Sussex border which is just outside of Cranleigh.
Residents have told us their lives have been flipped upside down due to the nature of the development.
The land which has the development on it is greenbelt and had been previously used for horses
One resident, who wished to be kept anonymous, told us his house had become absolutely worthless overnight.
He told us that building work in the area went on to as late as 2am in the morning with the site 'lit up like Gatwick Airport', with hundreds of trucks coming down what was previously a quiet country lane.
He added one other neighbour had been in floods of tears about the situation.
Waverley Borough Council told us they had served two Stop notices to the camp, however both had been ignored
They added that they were pursuing all appropriate legal options to secure the reversal of any unauthorised development, and to prevent any further planning breaches.
The council's statement ended assuring the community that they would continue to engage and provide updates as soon as they could
The local resident we spoke to admitted to us that he was quite impressed with how quickly the new development was able to be set up, and described it to us as an 'industrial style process'.
Local MP Jeremy Hunt visited the site earlier, and says he is writing to Steve Reed MP, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, to ask why the law cannot be changed to prevent such blatant legal breaches.
The local resident told us there was a strong sense of anxiety within the local community as the families had not moved into the new developments yet.