House sellers will have to reveal issues with their properties before selling new under government plans to reduce costs for buyers and speed up transactions.
These changes – dubbed by the government as “the biggest overhaul of the home buying system” in England’s history – might also see buyers and sellers signing “binding contracts” to prevent deals collapsing.
Central to the reforms is a new rule requiring sellers and estate agents to provide buyers with key details upfront, including their property’s council tax band, its EPC rating, building safety data, a property condition assessment tailored to the property’s age and type, as well as planning consents, flood risk data, chain status and floor plans. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) says sellers and agents must share information from searches and surveys before a property is listed, with listings also needing to specify leasehold costs and whether the sale is part of a property chain. This would help buyers make informed decisions before offering and reduce failed transactions.
Buyers and sellers could also opt for binding contracts, which might stop parties pulling out months into the process, saving families heartache and hundreds of pounds.
The government reckons these reforms could shave four weeks off the buying process.
Fixing the UK’s clunky property transaction system is a cracking idea – and one that HouzeCheck fully supports. Steve Reed, the Housing Secretary, nailed it when he said “Buying a home should be a dream, not a nightmare.” It’s brilliant to see the government tackling the system. We need faster, more certain transactions.
However, the UK government’s history with big tech projects is not entirely glorious. Some of you might recall Tony Blair’s attempt to digitise the NHS with a single, central nationwide electronic care record for patients, linking GPs to hospitals for secure, audited access. Budgeted at £6.2 billion, it flopped and was scrapped in 2011 after nearly a decade of problems having racked up £12.7 billion in costs.
Obviously, that was ages ago, but the reasons it went pear-shaped still raise red flags today. The government underestimated the system’s complexity, didn’t involve stakeholders or end-users properly (resulting in impractical systems), and misjudged risks in massive IT projects. Rapid tech obsolescence, shonky change-management, and poor contract oversight (like Accenture’s 2006 exit with minimal penalties despite £1 billion liability clauses) didn’t help. The Public Accounts Committee and National Audit Office branded it one of the UK’s worst public-sector contracting disasters.
And the property industry has been here before, too. Collectively, we poured vast amounts of time and money into preparing for HIPS – only for the whole thing to be scrapped with nothing to replace it.
So, while Steve Reed’s ambition is spot-on, you can see why I’m not convinced it’s going to run like clockwork.
What can conveyancers do to future-proof themselves if this project goes sideways? First, they should get stuck into their own digital tools and invest in their own tech. This is certainly paying off for HouzeCheck: the average time it takes us to get a report completed and delivered is between 2¾-3 days (not bad considering a building survey takes one day to complete). Indeed, we have completed a valuation on the same day it was ordered before now. While we had to work hard to ensure the surveying process runs so smoothly, I like to think we’re doing our bit – and that it’s paying off. Given that every early forecast is for a shortage of surveyors, conveyancers should be opening up conversations with potential partners at the earliest opportunity.
You can also reduce transaction uncertainty by locking in buyers – even without binding contracts. One of the two perks of buyers paying for a survey is that the sunk cost helps tie them to the deal (the other is the commission).
Steve Reed’s reforms could revolutionise UK homebuying, cutting delays and heartache with upfront disclosures and binding contracts. But past government digitisation fiascos overshadow the proverbial feast like Banqo’s ghosts.
So, I’d urge a bit of caution before we go all-in on this digital plan. Brokers and agents shouldn’t wait for the government to swoop in – they should embrace tech to speed things up and develop their own ways to secure deals. Let’s make homeownership a reality, not another costly nightmare.
