The Conveyancing Industry has been shrinking for some time now. In the last twenty years we have been through a recession where there were large numbers of redundancies followed by a global pandemic, so it is no surprise the number of Conveyancers is reducing year on year.
The crisis here not only lies in with the declining numbers, but with the decline in experience and knowledge.
So, why are conveyancers making their move away from Conveyancing?
A Today’s Conveyancer survey in 2021 revealed that 49% of Conveyancers had seen colleagues leave the profession in the preceding six months and a Conveyancing Foundation report stated that 80% of those Conveyancers surveyed had experienced a decline in their mental health during the pandemic. It has become apparent in recent years that even with the technology available to streamline a conveyancing transaction, caseloads are too high resulting in increased stress levels and poor mental health for Conveyancers. Clients have become more and more demanding and reviews have become far more important. Conveyancers have reported a lack of work/ life balance and high stress.
In 2021/ 2022, there were 18,927 law graduates. It appears there are far more lucrative and desirable areas of law for these graduates to start their legal careers resulting in a very low percentage of the graduates entering the Conveyancing profession. The competitive market that is Conveyancing means that profit margins are low and firms are not able to pay the salaries required, particularly in a cost of living crisis.
The increased caseloads, the high stress levels, and the less lucrative salaries are all factors which have forced knowledgeable and experienced conveyancers out of the profession and have deterred graduates from entering.
How is Conveyancing losing experience?
With a lack of experienced conveyancers, comes a lack of experience and knowledge in the profession. Historically, junior conveyancers (and those in assisting positions) relied on being taught, by a senior lawyer, the skills and processes to enable them to become successful and competent conveyancers.
Only 13% of land in England and Wales is now unregistered. Experienced conveyancers have the skills of drafting epitomes on title and investigating unregistered land as they dealt with unregistered titles more often years ago. It is highly unlikely a newly qualified Conveyancer will have the relevant skills to be in a position to accurately investigate an unregistered title as they will not have had the exposure to such matters. This is a skill set that must be passed down through more experienced members of the profession as although it is not a common task, the skills associated with unregistered land and the law behind it, is vital to the understanding of registered title.
Experienced Conveyancers will often have their own large caseload of complex matters. They will be experiencing similar stresses, pressures and demands as their less experienced colleagues. Finding the time to teach, explain and guide the more junior members of staff through complicated transactions is going to result in increased levels of stress. As a result, knowledge and wisdom is not being passed down as it was a few decades ago.
It takes years (decades!) to have the exposure needed to be classed as an expert in Conveyancing, There will always be an unusual title or a complicated lease which will challenge even the most knowledgeable Conveyancer. There is a recent trend which will attempt to train a conveyancer in months and although the procedures and basic skills can be developed in this time successfully, the knowledge of the law and the reasons behind the processes cannot be learned in this time. As a result, the profession may acquire inexperienced conveyancers with a distinct lack of legal knowledge, with conduct of complicated transactions. The most knowledgeable conveyancers are often those who have started at a junior level and have gained the experienced and qualifications over a number of years allowing them to progress to senior level. It is important that we encourage junior level employees and nurture them over many years to develop their skills required to become experienced conveyancers.
By losing the experienced portion of the profession, whether it be as a result of retirement or a change in career, with it, we lose many skills.
There are of course, serious consequences resulting from a lack of expertise and experience within the profession. Limited understanding of land law, contract law and conveyancing in general can lead to indemnity claims, removal from lender panels and enormous financial losses to firms. More importantly, inexperience and lack of knowledge can lead to purchasers being given incorrect or inaccurate advice, resulting in financial loss and unnecessary stress. In order to be successful and competent, a Conveyancer must understand the consequences of their actions and the advice they offer to clients and this experience is often passed down through more senior lawyers.
It is essential that as a profession, we encourage and support junior members of staff so that they gain the valuable skills and experience over the course of their conveyancing journey to become suitably knowledgeable and have the expertise required to become a successful lawyer. We need to support the wellbeing of not only the young and inexperienced individuals, but we need to care and nurture those who do have the expertise to ensure they can pass on their specialist skills to others.
At ntitle, we are fortunate to have a team of expert title investigators, many of which have chosen to move away from transactional conveyancing work themselves. They are highly qualified, highly experienced conveyancers with a wealth of conveyancing and title knowledge between them. We are able to provide firms with a specialised title investigation service ensuring that title reports are accurate and informative, and enquiries are relevant and necessary, all within 48 hours.
Our clients have reported that ntitle gives them the reassurance that an expert has reviewed the title and that they can trust the service. Some clients have used the ntitle service as a training tool for more junior members of staff to be able to compare reports.
As the number of experienced Conveyancers declines in the industry, at ntitle we can relieve some of the pressures passed onto the remaining conveyancers. Experienced conveyancers could even use the time to train more junior conveyancers whilst we do the title investigation!
