Just 16% of property listing include the required information on portal listings because the CRMs have not developed their systems to send the data to them, it has been claimed.

In April of this year, the National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency Team took the first step on the road towards the mandatory disclosure of material information in property listings.

It announced three stages of material information disclosure and published Part A earlier this year.

Some of the main portals introduced new fields to cover the material information listed in Part A.

Information such as price and tenure exist as fields, and more recently introduced fields include shared ownership costs, ground rent and ground rent review period, annual service charge and council tax band.

But while portals have created categories where these details can be entered, Beth Rudolf, director of delivery at the Conveyancing Association, warms that the customer relationship management systems (CRMs) have not developed their systems to send the necessary information.

Speaking at iamproperty’s latest gathering of its Partner Agent Advisory Council (PAAC), Rudolf said top of the list for what agents can do to effectively embrace upfront Material Information was finding the right technology, not only to identify and collate the information, but to transfer it to the portals they use.

She added that the “portals are reporting that only 16% of property adverts include the legally required Information because the CRMs have not developed their systems to send the data to them”.

The challenging conveyancing landscape was discussed, with everyone agreeing it’s even more important to get the basics right to keep sales moving. This comes as there is a lot of external conversation around the conveyancing process, with the time to exchange taking longer than ever before, increasing to 135 days, research shows.

The conversation then moved on to role that upfront Material Information can play, to reduce the rate of fall throughs and shorten transaction times.

Fall through rates currently stand at 24% with transactions taking 22 weeks to complete on average, according to Rudolf.

Rudolf believes gathering more material facts and property information as early as possible, has the power to reduce transaction times significantly to 8-12 weeks.

She said: “It is going to become a buyer’s market, after being a seller’s market over the last few years. Naturally, the recession and cost of living factors will see a quietening of the market. For those looking to transact, agents will need to focus on enabling sellers to provide a better-quality property to market. What I mean by this, is collating Material Information upfront to lessen the chance of sales falling through, providing more information to prospective buyers and protecting transactions for the sellers but also the estate agent’s own pipelines.

“Collating all of this at the point of onboarding the seller gives the agent a chance to look for, and resolve, any issues before going to market and gives a wider open market for properties. It ensures all parties have the facts and transparency to make informed decisions, making it much less likely for buyers to withdraw from transactions later down the line or apply to a lender who will decline their application because the property does not meet their lending policy, and speeding up the process overall. Certainly, in the early months of the New Year, agents aren’t going to see as much return so it is especially important to do what’s in their power to avoid sales falling through.”

It comes as no surprise that the current economic climate is the main challenge agents need support to navigate, according to Ben Ridgway, MD of iamproperty.

He commented: Reduced transaction times and having all the material information as early as possible, is key to securing and pushing through sales, which is what we’re supporting our partner Agents with via iamproperty movebutler.

“It doesn’t just tick a compliance box, it can help agents to secure sales. Every bit of information is good for sales pitches and working out which potential buyer to seek out or go to. Material Information doesn’t have to be another thing on the to-do list. Tapping into the right tech can do the job for agents. With parts B and C set to come into play in the New Year, onboarding the right tech now will help agents to get ahead.”