The National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA), is asking the government to recognise that what is left of HIPs is unworkable now the Home Condition Report (HCR) is not mandatory, and to find other ways of improving the property buying and selling process.
Peter Bolton King, the Chief Ececutive Officer of the NAEA comments:
Whatever anyone might think about the whole concept of HIPs, it is nonsense to make only part voluntary. The majority of the remaining compulsory documents are, at best, often unnecessary before a sale is agreed and, at worst, unintelligible without legal interpretation or likely to become out of date.
The Government’s stated reason for bringing in HIPS was that if potential purchasers were armed with all the information fewer sales would fall through. However there is little evidence that sales fall through because of legal, title or search problems and as such there is absolutely no need to insist on this information being made available prior to a sale being agreed. Bolton King says,
In any case the advent of quick E Conveyancing removes much of the need for the legal part of a HIP anyway. The Government should now take the bull by the horns and make the decision to repeal the introduction of HIPs and return to the drawing board.
According to the NAEA, this leaves the question of the EU requirement for an energy rating certificate. The Government must now urgently agree with Industry who will be carrying out the compulsory energy rating check. This is shortly to be expanded to cover not only houses being sold but also those being rented and commercial properties. The Association supports the idea that there should be a separate stand-alone qualification to cover this and will work with Government to hopefully rapidly bring this about. Qualified Home Inspectors will not be interested in spending their lives doing just this. We believe that the requirement can easily be achieved via accredited Estate Agents at the time they are placing a house on the market.
