When the government announced its u-turn over Home Condition Reports (HCRs), the reason was principally pinned on the lack of home inspectors that would have been trained by the time Home Information Packs (HIPs) were due to go live. Much of the attention since then has been focussed on what will happen to those companies which had invested in becoming HIP providers, with some reinforcing their beliefs in the packs and others, such as Rightmove, deciding to leave the market altogether.
However, the government’s decision to leave HIPs teetering on the edge also opened up a black hole beneath those that had trained to become home inspectors. Many had left behind their old careers to pursue this option, while many more spent significant amounts of time and money retraining from their current roles within the housing market to take up the mantle of home inspecting.
Therefore, what is to happen now to all these people now that their main job, to commission HCRs, has been axed?
Disenchantment
Obviously there was a certain amount of disenchantment at the announcement among home inspectors; something not helped by the confusion and uncertainty among HIP providers as they formulated their next move.
Mark O’Dolan, group sales director and managing director at Habitus, sums the general feeling up. “Until we stepped forward and communicated our proposal to home inspectors, it is safe to say they were in a state of disarray. They were looking for work and wanted to know what they could do now there were no HCRs.”
Therefore, with the removal of the mandatory HCR, the attention was firmly focussed on the Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) as the crux of the HIPs proposition. This, the HIP providers argue, will provide more than enough work for those qualified home inspectors.
Dominic Toller, director of marketing and new business at LMS, comments: “There is still a substantial demand for home inspectors. They can do more EPCs in a day than HCRs; roughly six rather than two, so there will be less pressure on numbers.”
However, as was revealed by the government when it relegated HCRs to voluntary status, the number of home inspectors is still a worry and the decision has not helped this situation.
Toller continues: “A number of the home inspectors who were thinking about training will now be thinking twice. Therefore, the government needs to inject more confidence into those would-be home inspectors and make it clear they’ll have a job at the end of it.”
Whatever happens to HIPs over the next few months, whether they remain voluntary, become mandatory or are scrapped altogether, the fate for home inspectors remains hazy. Many have spent thousands of pounds of their own money and given up their previous careers to fulfil this role and the removal of mandatory HCRs is a bitter blow to all those people.
However, those providers with a stake in the HIPs market will be looking to recoup their money and build a business and they insist there is a need for home inspectors.
Mike Ockenham, director-general of the Association of Home Information Pack Providers (AHIPPs), says: “The word to the home inspector community is the industry is still behind HCRs and for that to happen there has to be home inspectors. The qualification is a launchpad for other forms of surveying work and we would encourage them to continue and get the full qualification.”
