Over 12 months Project 28 has grown from 23 founding organisations to around 60 members, all aligned to the goal of reducing the average time from sale agreed to exchange from 112 days to 28. Here Anthony Rollason discusses the need for evidence that members are committed to improving transaction times at scale. As the Charter enters its second year, the challenge is no longer building support but demonstrating measurable results through transparent data, governance and accountability.
Launched in September 2025, Project 28 promised to reduce the average time from sale agreed to exchange from 112 days to 28. Twenty-three organisations committed to eight practical steps aimed at solving what’s now an £400 million annual problem for home movers, plus an estimated £1 billion in wasted professional effort.
Today, membership stands at around 60 organisations. But the question remains, what has actually moved?
Where Progress Stands
Project 28 has sustained momentum in a sector not famous for collective action. Membership opened to the wider industry in March 2026, and uptake has been swift spanning agents, conveyancers, lenders, brokers, and technology partners. For a voluntary charter with no regulatory backing, that is a notable recruitment achievement.
The initiative won ‘Corporate & Brand Campaign of the Year’ at the 2026 PRCA Public Affairs Awards, demonstrating significant industry engagement. However, the baseline data has not visibly moved. Landmark’s own materials still cite 112 days from sale agreed to exchange, the same figure quoted at launch. Independent analysis from Realyse suggests buyers are now waiting an average of around 17 weeks to exchange, with the full listing-to-completion journey stretching to nearly 289 days.
There are positive case studies within the membership. LMS’s reported 35% faster exchanges through its transaction network, and the widely-publicised six-day purchase completed by ONP Solicitors with iamproperty and Connells. But a case study is not a trend. With 60 members now, the Charter is in a stronger position than any industry initiative in a generation to publish aggregated, independently verified data comparing member and non-member transaction times.
The governance question scales with membership. At launch, practitioners asked who was at the table, and, just as importantly, who wasn’t. Twelve months on, the membership remains commercial, with no regulator and no consumer representative involved, and no external audit of outcomes.
What Project 28 should focus on next
The next twelve months should be about proving the cure, not promoting the campaign. Here are, in my opinion, five key priorities:
1. Publish the data: An updated national baseline, plus member-versus-non-member transaction times, verified by a party with no financial interest in the result. Sixty members generate enough transaction volume to make this statistically meaningful. Without independent data, the profession has no way to assess whether Project 28 is working.
2. Report on quality: Faster exchanges mean nothing if they produce more defects, complaints, or collapsed chains downstream. Consumer protection is the measure on which the profession will judge any speed initiative. Speed must not come at the expense of legal integrity.
3. Invite regulators and consumer voices into governance: Sixty members makes the Charter more representative of the industry, but it also concentrates in one self-governed body a large share of the sector’s collective influence over how transactions will be run. That is why independent participation in governance is essential.
4. Address accessibility: If meeting the commitments requires significant technology investment, smaller firms risk being excluded. Any successful reform must be accessible across the profession, not just to those with substantial digital infrastructure.
5. Tackle the workforce question: Training investment and retention belong on the agenda alongside data and technology. Client onboarding alone consumes two weeks at many firms; staff shortages and training gaps cannot be solved by software alone.
The path forward
The Scottish system of front-loaded property information and Home Reports demonstrates that earlier certainty in the transaction genuinely reduces enquiries, smooths communication and shortens timelines. If England and Wales move in that direction, Project 28’s core principle may be vindicated. But that vindication requires evidence, not enthusiasm.
Simon Brown, CEO of Landmark Information Group, stated at the one-year anniversary event that the Charter is “moving from commitment to delivery.” Delivery is measurable. Commitments are promises.
There is a version of this story in which Project 28 becomes a genuine turning point for the profession: the year the industry stopped talking past each other, brought regulators and frontline conveyancers into the room, and let independent data, whatever it shows, guide the next stage. There is also a version in which the campaign continues to accumulate members, events and awards while the 112-day average quietly becomes 119 or more.
The difference between those two futures is not ambition or technology. It is transparency.
Sixty members is a real constituency, arguably enough to constitute the industry’s voice on transaction reform if the Charter chooses to wield it responsibly. The profession has every reason to engage constructively with Project 28, and every reason to ask for evidence rather than take enthusiasm on trust. The diagnosis was always sound. The next twelve months should be about proving the cure.
About the author
Anthony Rollason is a seasoned conveyancing industry professional with over 25 years of experience in the UK property transaction sector. He has built a substantial reputation as a well-known figure within the conveyancing community.
His career has spanned multiple dimensions of the legal property sector, with particular expertise in case management systems and legal due diligence reporting. Anthony’s work focuses on supporting residential and commercial conveyancing firms.
Anthony is recognised for bridging the gap between technology providers and legal practitioners, helping firms navigate the evolving landscape of property transaction systems while maintaining regulatory compliance and service quality standards.
The views expressed in this feature are those of the author and not those of Today’s Conveyancer.
2 responses
There is no hope of Project 28 being the group that brings down times to completion based on it’s membership to date.
Most of the members are prime offenders for the factory panel conveyancer model which has destroyed conveyancing in England and Wales. To name a few guilty members in Project 28: Connells (owns Conveyancing Direct and has conveyancing panels consisting of some of the worst in the business), Movera (owns LMS and ONP), L&C (has conveyancing panels with some of the worst in the business) Simplify (operates some of the worst conveyancers in the business including Premier Property Lawyers and DC Law) and LPL (one of the worst conveyancers out there).
If you want good conveyancing, ban referral fees and create some consumer focused compulsory information that residential conveyancing firms and departments must publish e.g. mandatory publication of numbers of fully qualified staff members working in the firm/department and average numbers of files per conveyancer.
Agree with Anonymous – the firms that have signed up have some of the worst reputations amongst conveyancers that know what they are doing and are frequently the cause of delays themselves.