The current home buying and selling process is notoriously slow, with transactions taking 21 weeks on average, while countries like Norway manage this in as little as four weeks. This is costly and uncertain for households, with one in three transactions falling through. The cost of these failed transactions is felt by households, who lose around £400 million each year in direct costs alone as a result, and there are much larger indirect impacts on people’s ability to make the right choices for their work and families. This Government are committed to reforming the housing market, making transactions easier and giving people more control over the management of their homes.
That is why, this week, the Government have set out new plans to modernise and streamline the way in which people buy and sell property. These modern, digital transactions will revolutionise the information available to consumers, delivering the right data at the right time, reducing the number of collapsing chains. The system will be enabled by accessible, standardised data, meaning that trusted information can be shared easily between customers and property professionals. This improved system will support our economy, increasing the volume of property transactions, and facilitating the labour market.
We have unveiled a package of measures to push this vision forwards. This includes: piloting approaches to digitalising and opening up crucial property data; committing to the introduction of common data standards across the home buying and selling sector, and continuing to drive adoption of digital identity services and electronic signatures in home buying and selling; and harnessing the information and expertise held by His Majesty’s Land Registry to drive innovation in the prop-tech sector and develop new services.
We know that this Government cannot do this on their own. That is why this work will be carried out in conjunction with the Digital Property Market Steering Group: representatives of industry and Government experts committed to digitalising home buying and selling, and delivering this change that is so badly needed.
Our vision is for a housing market that works for people of all ages, across all tenures, and in communities across the country. We therefore intend to publish a long-term housing strategy later this year setting out this vision, the steps we will take to achieve this, and how we will provide long-term certainty to the market.
[HCWS427]