Datarooms, popular with auctions houses into which property and legal documentation can be access by buyers and lawyers, could help streamline the home moving process following their introduction into private treaty sales.
The claim has been made by Property Information Products (PIP) whose founder launched datarooms into auctions in 2007. David Sandeman of Essential Information Group (EIG) has supplied over 270,000 datarooms in that time, into which he says over three million documents have been uploaded. He says the evidence 37m downloaded documents by 1.45m users is evidence of ‘appetite from buyers for information in a transaction.’ The
“We started introducing datarooms into the auction world in 2007. It transformed and streamlined the industry as it gave easy access to legal documents for the buyers and solicitors. It is exciting to now be able to offer this service to the private treaty market, with the benefit of digital Property Information Forms to assist estate agents with their compliance.”
While the solution taps into the push for more material and up front information to be made available to would-be purchasers up front, it also digitises currently manual elements including the completion of a digital property information form.
“Datarooms work for auctions, now they’re doing the same to private treaty sales,”
said PIP Ltd CEO Tim Main.
“at the outset, estate agents and sellers can order a title register, title plan as well as digital property information forms which can be completed online. These documents are posted to a free property specific PIP dataroom which can then be shared with legal professionals to enable the preparation of any relevant contract documentation.”
Main added that feedback to date is the forms work well for sellers who only complete the property information form once; estate agents to assist with compliance and communication; solicitors where admin is reduced and there’s no ties to third party tech solutions, PIP datarooms are agnostic; and buyers who are better informed and more secure.
Ed Mead, a veteran of the property industry, said
“With this there’s little excuse for agents not to be showing willing when it comes to providing upfront information in a way that also massively improves communication between all parties – it’s the law and will be ever more strongly enforced. Agents themselves can be seen to be improving the buying and selling process by using a simple free tool.”
Robert May, an industry and software professional, added
“In the often complex and emotionally challenging journey of selling a property, keeping track of the documents and certificates required for the conveyancing process is vital. PIP Datarooms provide a secure and streamlined solution, allowing all necessary documents to be collected, stored, and accessed in a single location. This not only alleviates the burden on vendors or grieving executors trying to gather paperwork under pressure, but also ensures a smoother, more efficient conveyancing process.”
