The future of home buying and selling

Considering the number of property transactions that take place every year, it would be reasonable to assume that the process has been refined to a quick and straightforward procedure. However, despite the importance of the process, it has been subject to much criticism and has not seen much improvement over the past few decades. 

Improving the speed and quality of the process to reduce fall throughs

The UK Government has made several attempts to improve the process. In 1997 the Labour Government carried out a review of the process with various proposals for reforms introduced through the 2000 Green Paper: Quality and Choice: A Decent Home for All. Following the transfer of government, the Conservative Party conducted research into the process, highlighting that while some action had been taken, the previous administration had failed to truly improve the speed and quality of the process to levels experienced in other nations. 

To fully understand the current frustrations within the process and to also ensure that the positive elements can be highlighted, Propertymark conducted a series of member roundtables. Many of the challenges facing agents were consistent across the country, with some issues more pronounced than others. Following discussions from our roundtables, our reform proposals have been broken down into the following three sections:

• Increasing consistency and transparency
• Improving the speed and quality of the process
• Reducing fall throughs

Download our position paper