Radon
The paper you have is a postcode-level radon indication. What reading in the living room has that paper not taken?
That paper has not taken a reading in the living room. A postcode-level indication is a picture of how radon likelihood looks across a district, drawn from maps, not from a detector in this house. Nothing on it is a measurement of the air you would sit in. The home survey has not tested radon either. It has not placed a detector and has not read one. UK radon maps, produced with the British Geological Survey, are that kind of area tool. They do not sample a living room. The reading the paper has missed is the one in that room.
Last reviewed 24 October 2026. Written for buyers in England and Wales unless this answer says otherwise. No named surveyor has signed this page. It is general guidance, not a report on your house, and not legal advice.
What is the fuller explanation?
Radon comes from the ground, and it varies between houses on the same street because floors, cellars and ventilation differ. A postcode sheet summarises an area. It can suggest that a measurement is worth having. It cannot say what the living room contains. A reading in that room would mean a detector left there and then reported on, which is a different product from a map print. The home survey did not carry out that measurement. Treating the postcode sheet as the room mixes the two up.
If you need a figure for the living room, commission a radon measurement in the house and keep it apart from both the postcode paper and the home survey. Tell the solicitor the paper is an area indication only. The survey has not tested radon and will not grow a room result by being shown the same sheet again. Do not describe the living room from a postcode. The paper never took the reading that would let you do that.
What should you ask your surveyor?
- Is the paper a postcode indication rather than a living-room reading?
- Did the home survey also leave radon unmeasured?
- Which room has still not had its air sampled?
What are the typical next steps?
- Treat the postcode paper as an area indication only.
- Do not quote it as a reading taken in the living room.
- Commission a measurement in the house if you need that room result.
Costs vary with the building and with who you instruct. Where this page does not cite a published figure, ask the surveyor, a relevant specialist, or your solicitor for a written quote. Do not treat a forum average as the price.
Also asked about this
If the postcode sheet looks reassuring, is the living room clear?
No. A reassuring area sheet has still not taken a reading in the living room, and the survey has not tested radon either. Maps describe a district, not the air in this house. The room result is simply missing. An area impression is not that result, whether it worries you or whether it does not.
Can the survey estimate the living room from the postcode sheet?
No. An estimate would pretend a reading had been taken. The paper is a postcode indication, and the home survey has not measured the living room. UK radon maps are area maps. They are not a detector on a shelf. The survey has not turned one into the other.