Is the home buying process bloated?

Is the Home Buying Process Bloated?

Look at the poor fish.

All he wanted to do was move house.

Instead, he's surrounded by Searches, surveys, AML checks, ID checks, title documents, property forms, mortgage requirements, lender requirements, enquiries, more enquiries, chain updates, emails, phone calls, and seemingly endless requests for information.

And perhaps that's a fairly accurate representation of how the average home mover feels.

The property industry talks constantly about information.

• We need more of it.

• We need it earlier.

• We need better material information.

• We need digital property information.

• We need property logbooks.

• We need sales packs.

• We need better ID verification.

• We need more transparency.

And broadly, we agree.

But we wonder whether we should ask a slightly different question:

Is the home buying process already bloated?

The problem facing a buyer or seller isn't necessarily a lack of information.

There is an enormous amount of it.

The problem is when it appears, where it sits, who has it, who needs it, and how many times somebody has to provide it.

A seller may provide information to an Estate agent.

• Then provide information to a Property lawyer.

• Then prove their identity.

• Then provide documents relating to their property.

• Then answer property information forms.

• Then respond to enquiries asking for further information.

Meanwhile, the buyer is arranging a mortgage, completing ID and AML requirements, organising a survey, waiting for searches, satisfying lender requirements and trying to understand what their property lawyer actually needs from them.

All of these things may be legitimate individually.

Collectively?

You get the fish....

More isn't necessarily better

This matters particularly now.

The Government has set out plans for one of the biggest changes to home buying and selling in years, including greater use of upfront information, sales packs, digital property logbooks, digital ID and better sharing of trusted property data.

That direction of travel is enormously encouraging.

But there is a danger.

If we bolt new requirements onto the existing process, we won't have fixed it. We'll have made the fish even bigger.

Upfront information shouldn't mean asking consumers to complete another layer of bureaucracy.

Digitisation shouldn't mean taking an inefficient analogue process and putting it on a screen.

And a property logbook shouldn't become simply another place where information is stored.

The opportunity is much bigger than that.

Get the right information at the right time

We've believed for years at Property Searches Direct that one of the fundamental problems with home moving is the sequence in which things happen.

• Why wait until weeks into a transaction to discover something that could have been identified at the beginning?

• Why wait for somebody else to order searches if a buyer is ready to get them underway?

• Why shouldn't a potential buyer be able to understand obvious environmental or property risks before becoming financially and emotionally committed?

• Why shouldn't lender considerations be explored earlier?

• Why does a seller start assembling important property documentation only once they've found a buyer?

And why do we repeatedly collect information that already exists?

That's the thinking behind much of what we've been building.

Our Hazard Checker helps buyers investigate potential risks earlier.

Our Lender Checker helps them consider lender requirements.

Buyers can order regulated property searches directly rather than simply waiting for the traditional process to reach that point. Results can then be provided to both the home mover and their property lawyer.

PSD Property Rooms allow important information and documents to be organised rather than scattered between inboxes, filing cabinets and different organisations.

None of this is about replacing property lawyers, estate agents, surveyors, lenders or anybody else involved in the transaction.

Quite the opposite.

It's about helping each of them receive better-prepared clients and better information sooner.

Perhaps we need to stop adding and start reorganising

For decades we've attempted to improve home moving by improving individual pieces of the transaction.

Perhaps the next stage is to look at the transaction as the consumer sees it.

• One journey.

• One home.

• One buyer.

• One seller.

Yet dozens of processes are happening around them.

The Government itself now says people should know what they're buying before committing significant time and money, with sales packs intended to bring key property information forward.

That principle is difficult to argue with.

But successful upfront information won't be measured by how much information we manage to put upfront.

It will be measured by whether it makes the transaction simpler.

• Does it prevent duplication?

• Does it identify problems earlier?

• Does it help buyers make better decisions?

• Does it help property lawyers get working sooner?

• Does it reduce unnecessary enquiries?

• Does it give sellers greater certainty?

• Does it reduce fall-throughs?

And, most importantly, does the home mover understand what's happening?

Because perhaps the property industry doesn't actually have an information shortage.

Perhaps it has an information management problem.

The next generation of home moving shouldn't, therefore, be about adding more and more to an already bloated process.

It should be about stripping out duplication, moving useful information to the beginning and allowing trusted data to travel with the property and the transaction.

Less chasing, Less repetition, Fewer surprises.
Better prepared buyers and sellers.

The home mover doesn't need to understand every moving part of the property industry.

They shouldn't have to.

After all…

They just wanted to move house.