Conveyancers have been urged to work with estate agents on providing the material information disclosures required by the National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency Team (NTSELAT) as part of efforts to make more information available up front for home movers.
Addressing delegates at the Bold Legal Conference Head of NTSELAT James Munro said that there was work going on behind the scenes with estate agents and the property portals (Rightmove, Zoopla, OnTheMarket) to update their systems, databases and websites and incorporate the information identified in Parts A, B and C disclosures announced in February 2022. While Part A has been implemented, Parts B and C may, according to Mr Munro, require the expertise of conveyancers to interpret the information for home movers and estate agents.
The disclosures are part of an initiative to provide more material information to consumers at an earlier stage in the home-moving process. It is anticipated that this would improve speed, crate greater surety in the transaction and ultimately reduce fall throughs which according to many conveyancers are running at an all time high.
Part A disclosures currently include Price/Rent, Tenure and Council Tax Band and is defined as
Information that, regardless of outcome, is always considered material for all properties regardless of location. This information generally involves unavoidable costs that will be incurred by the occupier regardless of the use of the property.
Parts B and C will include “non-standard” features with Munro suggesting that features like broadband speed and mobile phone signal will become increasingly important to home movers. Part C may include information about restrictive covenants (and their relevance), rights of way, and other location information conveyancers can help interpret the potential risks of.
Under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations, estate agents are already required to provide material information which the average consumer would need to make an informed decision. There has been much conjecture on what constitutes material information and when pressed on why NTSELAT had not taken enforcement action on agents which had clearly flouted the rules, Mr Munro suggested that the extent of non-compliance would make it unfeasible for his team to deal with.
“We could have gone down the road of taking enforcement action against agents or even the portals, but that won’t necessarily solve things. It just puts everyone on the back foot and makes people resentful and they won’t want to work with us. We want to secure compliance by working together.”
Mr Munro would not be drawn on the date for implementation of Part B and C as the work to update systems would take some time.
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5 Responses
To avoid the inevitable “free legals” whilst demanding speed (and presumably accuracy of work) wouldn’t it make sense that before a property is marketed the seller is advised by an estate agent or mortgage broker to have Title checked by a Solicitor so that any issues can be sorted much earlier in the process.
I don’t mind checking the title at the outset. Is there a good guide or video online?
If it was that easy to just ‘check title’, what is the point in a conveyancer? You are talking as though you can learn how to check a Land Registry Title from a simple youtube video…..
“What is the point in a conveyancer?” — A question I’ve frustratingly screamed on rare occasions!
Considering there are firms happy to employ people with no legal qualification and tasked them with checking titles, I am certain I could cover the basics after a little guidance, then advise prospective buyers accordingly.
I note the contents of the article has changed since my original post.
A title check will not disclose the material facts that are required. It will help to prove who the owner is and how onerous the transaction might be. Best things is to get a client to complete the BASPI ahead of marketing, collate all required supporting documentation and share its findings with conveyancer and estate agent. All completed easily in a digital environment. I would recommend that estate agents use Veya (from askveya) to explore the title as it will spell things out for them in an easy to understand way.