A leading conveyancing trade association has described the Government’s decision to extend first day marketing on HIPs as ‘a sad inevitablity’.
The Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO), the major trade association for the property search industry, said the decision to delay what would be a full roll-out for HIPs was the fault of under-performing local authorities.
The decision to extend first day marketing, which allows properties to be put up for sale as soon as a HIP is applied for instead of waiting for a completed pack, was announced today (8th May) by Caroline Flint MP. The concession, which was initially due to end on 1st June 2008, will now stay in place until the end of the year.
Fiona Hoyle, chairman of CoPSO, insists this decision was forced on the government because their own guidelines, introduced to speed up the time it takes to produce a HIP, are being ignored.
The Access Guidelines were introduced by the CLG three months ago to reduce the amount of time private search firms were waiting to access local authority records, and to speed up the searches that are an important part of HIPs.
But Fiona Hoyle claims that many local authorities are simply ignoring the guidelines:
“The Guidelines clearly state that local authorities should provide access within 24 hours, and that just hasn’t been the case. In some areas, it is taking local authorities a month to provide the information. With this in mind, extending first day marketing had a sad inevitability about it.”
“This is a very important issue for the entire UK housing market. If the local authorities persist in restricting access, then the time it takes to produce a local search will be affected, and this will have a negative impact on conveyancing. In a nutshell, the stubborness of some of the local authorities could be slowing down the home buying process across the country.
“Local authorities now have six months to put their house in order. What is needed is investment to drive real efficiencies in the way councils both hold provide access to information. Government must deliver a fair and equitable framework to fund these essential reforms following their recent consultation on charging for information. Without this, the delays look set to continue.”
ENDS
For further information please contact:
Blythe Weigh Communications
Paul Weigh 020 7138 3208
David Murphy 020 7138 3206
Notes to Editors:
The Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO) is the leading trade association for the property search industry. Members provide a range of property information reports including local, environmental, chancel repair, mining, drainage and water data and produce over 2m searches each year. CoPSO’s overall objective is to drive both market and product improvements to deliver the industry’s vision of faster and better informed property transactions.
CoPSO has represented the search industry on the Government’s working groups reviewing the content of Home Information Packs.