Estate agents are being encouraged to embrace upfront material information to enable a more informed buyer decision making, greater confidence in the property market and a smoother, less stressful process for everyone involved.
Jon Horton, product director at mio, argues that those agents who harness upfront material information now, rather than wait for further regulation changes, will be ahead of the game.
He points out that Trading Standards CPR regulations are expected to move towards disclosing features such as flood risk, broadband and mobile signal.
“There will always be some early adopters and those who prefer to watch and observe from the side-lines,” Horton said.
“Speaking to those early adopters, there are clear reasons to embrace the benefits that this brings, particularly in a challenging market where agents should look at every option available, to secure new business and manage a sale through to a successful conclusion,” he added. “The biggest challenge is change itself, but logically upfront material information makes sense to help reduce transaction times and mitigate fall-throughs – the two biggest worries for agency owners.”
Tom Carter, partner and former chairman at McCartneys, believes that agents need to adopt “a change of mindset” to get themselves better organised upfront.
Main board director at Propertymark, Simon Wilkinson, added: “The leaders and early adopters will adopt what we perceive to be best practice, but very soon it marginalises those who are non-adopters. They will start to lose business because those leaders are then winning business, and so therefore the industry will change.”
