Our profession rightly holds itself accountable to the highest standards and prides itself on the rock-solid worth of an unsullied reputation.
Eric Curran is managing partner of DM Hall Chartered Surveyors, based in the firm's Glasgow North office.
Home Reports in Scotland have been an outstanding gold star in the surveying profession's jotter. They were instrumental, on their introduction, in stabilising a turbulent market and they have proved an efficient and well-understood tool in the succeeding years.
However, despite the fact that the majority now undoubtedly serve the purpose for which they were created - providing transparency, impartiality and clear, unequivocal information - there is evidence that some inconsistency remains.
On occasion, when respected professional firms are asked for reappraisals by a third party, it becomes clear that some reports - which unfailingly have been preceded by a cheap fee - wrongly apportion repair categories and miss or do not provide clear information on defects.
How can this be, in a profession which rightly holds itself accountable to the highest standards and prides itself on the rock-solid worth of an unsullied reputation?
The answer, I suspect, is a combination of human nature and double standards which, in microcosm, reflect some of the pressures under which surveyors labour, and which have always been present to a greater or lesser degree.
There is no doubt that there are double standards inherent in house transactions - the biggest financial commitment most people will ever make in their lives. They arise from the huge variance in the perspective of buyers and sellers.
In the view of many sellers, the Home Report should emphasise everything that is wonderful about the property, which in many cases has been their pride and joy and in which they have invested considerable emotional capital. Negativity is not appreciated.
However, when the same sellers become purchasers, the perspective flips. Now they want exactly the opposite - a Home Report which doesn't tell them all the positives and focuses on what's wrong with the property physically, in order to provide a bargaining counter on price.
Occasionally, buyers also expect advice far beyond the confines of the report and regard it as a guarantee against future defects - and the surveyor is caught in the middle of this web, trying to manage conflicting expectations.
Why do some property professionals - disproportionately the more recent entrants to the market - accede to the pressures to comply with the seller’s partial and biased view of the merits of the asset?
There are a number of understandable reasons. Some people just do not possess the personal skills to enable them to stand up to abusive and intransigent clients; some may fear losing business from instructors; the biggest fear is upsetting the client base.
But while these reasons may be understandable, they are professionally invalid. Reputation is a fragile flower and surveyors have a major part to play in educating other parties involved in the transaction process about realistic expectations.
It is fair to listen to clients' arguments, but it is also imperative to point out how, if the surveyor accommodated them, they might feel if they were on the other side of the transaction.
It is also perfectly within professional bounds for a surveyor to close his notebook and walk away from the situation if a client is being abusive, coercive, unreasonable or irrational. The client will need an RICS surveyor to complete, and perhaps a salutary lesson in proper business behaviour may alter his or her attitude to the next professional who accepts the brief.
Since Home Reports achieved the authority they now enjoy, agents have effectively handed the baton of client expectation management to surveyors and it often falls to them to keep everyone on the track of impartiality and professional judgement.
Surveyors should be acutely aware that they are the only people who are in the transactional process for the long term, since lenders will rely on their valuation for periods of up to 35 years.
It would be comforting to think that Home Reports are steering buyers and sellers in the right direction in terms of expectations, but until then it is up to all surveyors to continue the educational process by the simple expedient of doing the right thing.
