The national press have waded into the HIP debate and started to slam the products on the grounds that they will add £1,000 to the home sellers' bill. This follows months of complaining in the mortgage, estate agency and legal trade press that HIPs will never work, that they will delay the house selling process rather than speed it up and, worse still, that they will dampen the housing market.
Opposition parties and industry groups are even insisting that HIPs will generate an army of unregulated pack providers and that buyers will end up purchasing their own surveys as they will not trust the ones given to them by the seller.
But no consumer groups are voicing anti-HIP sentiments. Nor are the major estate agency chains, who prefer to quietly get on with developing their HIP propositions rather than waste energy attempting to put off the inevitable.
The reason for the great divide is simple. Whilst customers gain from the rapidly changing housing market, independent estate agents, mortgage brokers and the legal profession could all lose out and are therefore the most vociferous critics. But their arguments fly in the face of reality. Under the present system far more cost than the likely price of a HIP can be incurred by the buyer not being privy to necessary information before committing to a purchase price.
When information does come to light following a survey the seller can lose money if the buyer has to pull out. But Local Authorities benefit financially from the present home selling scenario by getting paid to provide new searches for the same property, and surveyors are kept in business by duplicate surveys.
Marcus Cox, co-founder of on-line HIP provider mysalepack.com, said: “Research has shown that the current system is extremely inefficient and wasteful and does not look after the best interests of buyers or sellers. Many of the arguments being used by those lobbying against HIPs are also not factually correct and the idea being bandied about that HIPs will be a breeding ground for cowboys is absurd.
“If anything, the new Home Inspector qualification and licence is the area that simply cannot be criticised, because it will provide new regulation and consistency amongst surveyors. The Home Inspector has a duty to the future buyer and the mortgage lender and is not biased towards the seller.
“The new system will deliver one survey and one set of searches and, like with any other product you buy, information will now be available before a house goes up for sale,” continued Cox.
“Research conducted by both Which? Magazine and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister shows that most buyers and sellers welcome these changes in principle, so armchair critics should be looking at ways of ensuring that these proposals are delivered in the right way for the consumer and not waste their energy on counter-spin,“ he concluded.
