The Centre for Finance, Innovation and Technology (CFIT) has announced the “Phase 2” of its Open Property Coalition to test the implementation of digital processes and smart data usage in homebuying and selling.
Following CFIT’s Open Property Roadmap published earlier this year, and in response to the government’s buying and selling reforms, the Coalition will test the practical elements needed to make digital buying work across the property ecosystem.
Over the coming months, Coalition members will develop and test real-world use cases, including Digital Property ID and wider Smart Data-enabled use cases, to assess how existing standards and trust arrangements work, and examine practical barriers to adoption.
The Coalition was established to address long-standing inefficiencies within the UK property transaction process and come up with solutions. It builds on existing work across the market, including the DPMSG-sponsored Smart Property Data Trust Framework Sandbox, the Smart Data Guidebook and established industry standards and infrastructure.
Rather than creating parallel frameworks, CFIT will focus on testing how these existing approaches can support trusted data sharing.
During the Coalition’s first phase, members developed a roadmap setting out how Smart Data principles could underpin a more trusted, secure and consumer-centric homebuying journey. Phase 2 will focus on testing what works in practice and building the evidence needed to support wider implementation.
Anna Wallace, CEO of CFIT, said: “The breadth of industry support for the next phase of CFIT’s Open Property Coalition is a significant step forward. Today’s announcement reflects growing alignment between industry, government and the Digital Property Market Steering Group on what needs to change, and we now have a real opportunity to turn our ambition to create a digital and more efficient homebuying process into reality.”
Travis Scholes, commercial director at LMS, said: “The foundations for a more connected homebuying process are already being established across the market. The opportunity now is to connect the organisations, expertise and infrastructure needed to drive adoption at scale. The challenge is no longer proving what is possible, but creating the alignment needed to make it the norm. By bringing together stakeholders from across the ecosystem, this Coalition provides a practical route to turning policy ambition into real-world outcomes.”
Brad Fordham, head of mortgage distribution and underwriting at NatWest, said: “Buying a home is one of the biggest financial decisions our customers make, but securing a mortgage is only one part of a much wider and often complex journey. Lenders rely on trusted information from across the property ecosystem, so there is a significant opportunity to use Smart Data and digital technology to make that information easier to verify and share securely. Open Property brings together the organisations needed to explore how that can work across the whole transaction, rather than improving individual stages in isolation. By testing these approaches in practice, we can help build the evidence and confidence needed to create a simpler, more transparent homebuying experience for customers.”
The evidence generated will help inform the wider work of government, the Digital Property Market Steering Group (DPMSG) and industry.
The Coalition brings together expertise from across the entire homebuying chain, including major mortgage lenders, property technology providers, conveyancers, estate agents, government departments, regulators, standards bodies and industry organisations.
Participants in the CFIT include the Conveyancing Information Executive (CIE), Connells Group, Council of Property Search Organisations (COPSO), Groundsure, HSBC UK, Lloyds Banking Group, LMS, NatWest, OneID, PEXA, TM Group, and many others.
