Archive

The convicted murderer and rapist John Cannan, who is the prime suspect in the still-unsolved murder of estate agent Suzy Lamplugh,...

Rightmove is at the centre of a revolutionary advertising initiative involving Channel 4’s Location, Location, Location. Using Artificial Intelligence technology, a digital...

As we move into the autumn of 2021, what the coming year has in store for estate agents is something we...

In this guest editorial, experienced property solicitor Lorraine Richardson argues that reservation agreements - designed to reduce the number of fall-throughs in...

Industry-wide adoption of Unique Property Reference Numbers could be one step closer after an announcement by a major trade body. The Conveyancing...

Homebuyers are suffering huge delays in receiving responses to their search requests to council according to a study of local authorities. Consumer...

A bulk quick buy company has surveyed purchasers who have been deterred from continuing their transactions to discover what the biggest...

The estate agents’ trade body has set out three ways conveyancers can further help the sales process. Propertymark has made the suggestions...

Purplebricks’ chief executive says a £4m marketing blitz scheduled for the autumn will go ahead despite the upheaval caused by the...

The already-high fall-through rate for transactions is likely to be supercharged by the impending end of the tapered stamp duty holiday...

It’s a big ask to expect anyone to suddenly change what they have always done, particularly if their results have proven...

Purplebricks is to launch an extensive marketing campaign after this summer’s Olympics to emphasise the local knowledge of its 600 agents...

Free to list portal Residential People has launched a filter allowing users to sort properties by EPC rating.  The new ‘Energy Efficiency...

The government has thrown its weight behind the concept of Unique Property Reference Numbers as a way of speeding up transactions. UPRNs...

There may well have been times in recent weeks when any agent would have been forgiven for wanting a break -...

In an unusual move, HM Land Registry has issued guidance to agents to help them reassure jittery buyers and sellers ahead...

In the first of a two-part special with the presidents of the UK’s largest property trade organisation, we carry out an...

The current housing market frenzy would be easier to deal with if upfront buyers’ packs were available, improving transparency and cutting...

New research has found that homebuyers would prioritise buying a home with superfast broadband over being close to a good school.  A...

The controversial demands of Trading Standards for more “material information” to be provided upfront in property details have been criticised by...

Thousands of sales are at risk because slow searches by councils may prevent deals completing by the next stamp duty deadline. With just under...

Changes to the way the property market operates over the last year - with increased flexibility and remote interactions - has...

National Trading Standards wants agents, portals and industry groups to come up with ways to provide basic essential material information ‘upfront’.  The National...

A PropTech firm says its new tool allows comprehensive upfront property information to be shared instantly with all parties in a...

A survey of 5,000 agents suggests the slow house selling and buying process is one of the biggest challenges facing the...

A leading conveyancing industry chief says the one factor that would help improve the slow house buying process today would be the...

The UK property market is always evolving but never as quickly as it is now. Traditional estate agents are seriously questioning...

With March marking one year since the beginning of the first national lockdown across all four nations of Britain in response...

The Chancellor’s recent announcement that the stamp duty holiday would be extended for another three months was undoubtedly great news for...

One year on from the UK’s first stay-at-home order, London has been overtaken as the most searched-for location on Rightmove, according...

Another TV programme will this weekend examine the fate of Suzy Lamplugh, the London estate agent who disappeared 35 years ago...

No fewer than 79 per cent of people want the stamp duty holiday extended according to a survey conducted by an...

A leading agent says the worst thing that could happen with Wednesday’s Budget is if the Chancellor does not deliver on...

A high-profile London agency is asking the police and property industry bodies including Trading Standards to investigate a fake company posing under...

Properties are currently taking 29 per cent longer than average to sell once under offer, according to research by a home...

A new appeal has been launched to discover what happened to missing London agent Suzy Lamplugh. She disappeared in July 1986, aged 25....

Homeowners staying at home during another lockdown are doing more than sharing memes of groundhog day or doing family quizzes on...

The stamp duty holiday should be extended to include properties that have exchanged but have yet to complete, a leading accountancy...

The property market became somewhat fractious during 2020. After receiving a much-needed boost with the promise of stamp duty relief, things...

The latest Rightmove analysis shows it now takes 126 days from the time an offer is accepted until legal completion -...

Countrywide and Foxtons have thrown their weight behind an idea to identify every single UK residential property with a unique number. The...

A mortgage lender says it will now accept ‘no-search indemnity insurance’ for residential purchases in a bid to speed up the...

A trade body has called on House Secretary Robert Jenrick to intervene over the growing problem of delays in councils providing...

He’s gone from Downing Street but the legacy of Dominic Cummings lives on in Rightmove’s top searches of 2020. Barnard Castle -...

Zoopla saw a record 70.5 per cent increase in traffic on Boxing Day as signs suggest the pre-Christmas boom is set...

A cyber-attack on a London council has caused some transactions to fall through and others to be significantly delayed. The attack occurred...

Delays with the return of property searches is one key factor for sales taking longer to complete. As conveyancers start to warn...

‘Many are in complete denial about the time it takes and still think it’s eight to 10 weeks.’ I won’t tell you...

The secure Conservative victory in the 2019 General Election meant the property market in the sunlit uplands was set for a...

Two prominent suppliers have teamed up to offer customers instant visibility of chain lengths, details of agents connected to properties being...

A survey of completion times for house sales over the past four years suggests that the worst performing local authority area...

A mortgage technology platform has released figures suggesting the housing market remains strong, with high numbers of searches by buyers for...

Searches that are bound by the Search Code, protecting the seller, buyer and lender, are property and not client specific. As...

Just when you thought the housing market was beginning to calm down... along comes a likely vaccine for Coronavirus. One of the country’s...

Zoopla is the first UK property company to launch advertising on Pinterest, the lifestyle picture-centric social media platform. A statement from Zoopla...

A law firm wants the government to agree that properties that have exchanged but not yet completed can definitely benefit from the...

Many agents are brilliant at giving a personal touch and are professional in the way they treat customers, but I would...

Purplebricks recently launched a meditation service to help buyers and sellers manage stress. You might disagree with the idea, but moving...

We can all agree that the recovery of the property market since May has been outstanding. The latest data from Zoopla...

A conveyancing firm is blaming councils for delays in transactions. Conveyancers have themselves been sharply criticised in recent weeks as the sharp...

A new analysis of searches and leads to agents by Rightmove suggests buyers in London are deserting central locations in favour of...

I had a wry smile when I read the article on Monday from the conveyancers complaining about people getting off their...

Conveyancers are sending a blunt message to estate agents: transactions will take longer than usual and don’t chase us with queries and...

With many transactions now delayed by up to three weeks by slow searches, a body representing local search providers is urging...

It’s about this time of year, pandemic or not, that agents may be asked one particularly awkward question by a vendor...

A leading agency says so-called Covid Clauses are being inserted into contracts as buyers become increasingly cautious ahead of a possible...

Two agencies have entered the debate on whether the current frenzied housing market is seeing delays in completions. Yesterday EAT reported that...

The last few months have been tough for the property sector, and the pressure will continue as estate agents across the...

It has been three months since the property market was given the green light to reopen. During this time, we have...

Rightmove says a study of some 400,000 homes on its portal has revealed that those with a coveted south-facing garden have...

Another new PropTech platform claims it can streamline the completion process - this time by coordinating the work of estate agents...

Tuesday of this week was the busiest day of the year so far for searches for mortgages - widely seen as...

At a recent Conveyancing Association webinar focused on the provision of upfront information in the property sale process, there was a...

In the first of a series of articles, Emma Vigus, managing director of mio, the estate agent sales progression platform, explores the...

A survey of 2,000 prospective movers by Zoopla shows the vast majority still intent on buying - but younger purchasers’ plans...

Propertymark is calling in the government for agents to be trained in the use of software operating the Unique Property Reference...

Buyer registrations and sales enquiries are reportedly back to pre-Covid levels. Completions, however, are lagging behind. This is probably down to...

Today is one month since the government lifted restrictions on agents and the housing market - and since that time the...

A quarter of vendors and buyers contacted by a high-end agency say the lockdown and the Coronavirus crisis have made them...

OnTheMarket has introduced a new filter that allows buyers to limit their searches to those properties with online viewing options. These can...

A daily monitor of mortgage market activity has reported “significant volumes” of business across the sector, even over the weekend. Mortgage technology...

It’s back to work today for England’s estate agents and the housing market - but it’s the start of a new...

The demand for mortgages in April was scarcely a quarter of what it was in March - but the figures show...

Listings from an agent who ended his contract with Rightmove were not removed as he expected - instead, he is accusing...

Buying and selling a house is often referenced as being one of the most stressful life experiences that we can go...

Conveyancing search provider Searchflow has amended its website after an intervention by the Advertising Standards Authority. A claim on the site stated:...

At the moment, it somehow seems like tempting fate to think too far into the future, especially in terms of the...

An estate agency says it’s using so-called Covid Clauses in contracts to keep transactions on course. Knight Frank says it’s writing ‘Coronavirus...

A trade body has reported some council search departments to the government for refusing to provide email details and forcing search...

Just a month ago our homes felt, for many of us, to be a mere pitstop on a centrifuge of work,...

New guidance has just been agreed by conveyancers on house moves during the Coronavirus crisis. The procedures - made pubic only last...

It’s far too early for authoritative figures on how devastating the Coronavirus lockdown has been on estate agents but there is...

A trade group wants councils and search companies to co-operate more closely during the virus to minimise delays to the remaining...

A property portal is making the controversial claim that the Coronavirus has led to an increase in online interest in UK...

New research shows that 77 per cent of consumers use portals to conduct property searches - meaning, surprisingly, that almost a...

Zoopla has published a startling set of statistics to demonstrate what it calls “a record January with significant growth in delivery...

A new renovation start-up is operating across eight cities and claims to be able to transform properties - including ones that...

In the field of conveyancing, there’s a new dynamic at play. And that dynamic is customer-driven and customer-focused, using digital technology...

HM Land Registry appears to be making painfully slow progress on digitising land charge search data - contrary to its earlier...

Who are you and what does it say on your business card? Emily Hawthorne, mio Account Manager for the South West of...

Bristol is the location outside London most searched for on Rightmove this year, by both buyers and renters. The average asking price...

It’s one of the most crucial aspects of the homebuying and selling process but is too often bogged down by frustrating...

The Council of Property Search Organisations has named three industry figures as members of its newly-formed compliance committee, set to regulate...

Here’s the final part of our questioning of the three portals based on comments and queries from our readers - thanks...

OnTheMarket’s TV advert, promoting its ‘New & exclusive’ feature, will be back on screens from Boxing Day ahead of what it calls a...

Property voyeurism and the festive season have long been bedfellows for many Brits. The heady combination of over-indulgence and regret, close proximity...

A new portal has been launched aiming to take on Rightmove, Zoopla and OnTheMarket in the retirement property sector - and...

Humberts is the latest estate agency to announce that it’s going to offer customers the controversial Modern Method of Auction option. The...

Zoopla has revealed the most searched-for property terms on its portal in the past 12 months with ‘garage’, ‘parking’ and ‘garden’...

A PropTech firm has calculated the different delays that lead to transactions taking an average 120 days (and often much longer)...

A PropTech company that monitors search times for transactions says only just over two thirds of them are now completed in...

Reservation Agreements are the subject of the moment in the agency industry. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is to...

Zoopla says it now offers the fastest listings search of all three leading UK property portals on mobile devices. In turn, it...

An estate agency has been fined £30,000 for waiting until minutes after the sale of a flat was completed to tell...

This week’s Natter is dedicated to three contrasting agencies doing things differently, from a recently established hybrid to a design-led, Insta-friendly...

Hello and welcome to a new week - one with darker evenings and colder days. But there is still plenty of activity...

A trade body has sharply criticised HM Land Registry for its slow progress on digitising local searches after a promising start...

A relatively new company which signs up vendors and then effectively sub-contracts their sales to strongly-performing local estate agents says it...

Picture this: You have finally pushed that sale or purchase through, which means your client is over the moon and happy...

Earlier this year, the Regulation of Property Agents (RoPA) working group announced the initial details of plans for mandatory qualifications and...

In the old days an agent would procure clients based upon their position in the high street, the size of the...

A new service which launched in June and pledged to provide estate and letting agents with “game changing” access to property...

A London council admits that it typically takes 50 working days for a search - which means a Local Land Charge...

Carl Hemming, Director from Ginger in Balsall Common explains how mio has quickly proven to be a cost-effective way to simplify...

A local authority that last week warned that it could not provide any local searches for over six weeks has now...

A local authority in the Home Counties says it will not be possible to accept search queries for six weeks starting...

Who are you and what does it say on your business card? Eric Woodhams F.N.A.E.A. mio Account Manager What is mio and what...

The city of Norwich has become the sixth part of the UK to switch from council Local Land Charges to digital...

A buying agent has revealed how she advises potential clients to use portals when looking for a property to buy -...

A recently-launched free-to-list portal says it’s uniquely positioned to attract overseas buyers and investors interested in purchasing in major UK cities. Residential...

A ‘property potential’ portal which claims to be highly successful across the south east of England is now going to launch...

As an estate agent, you need to be ready to cater for the specific requirements of buyers and sellers, tailoring your...

With far-reaching reforms of conveyancing and other aspects of house buying high on the government’s agenda, a trade body has revealed...

There’s been a dramatic improvement in the speed of searches being completed and returned by local authorities, the government claims. Housing minister...

A new report from Zoopla claims very nearly a third of buyers want to know the street - or even the...

It’s been an interesting week of contrasts when it comes to online replacing ‘the old school’. Data from that clever consultancy The...

An analysis of property branding by more than 200 companies suggests that Purplebricks and OnTheMarket are two of the big winners with...

The town of Blackpool has become the fourth part of the UK to switch from council Local Land Charges to digital...

Artificial intelligence (AI) is playing an increasingly important role in our lives – from virtual assistants such as Amazon’s Alexa and...

Given that online property portals, dominated by a handful of websites, are by far the most popular home search method, it...

Conveyancing regularly adds unnecessary and costly delays to the home buying process and improvement could be far quicker than any efforts...

It’s the most obvious visual medium high street agents have at their disposal, and for many decades has been absolutely pivotal...

Police have confirmed that a search is taking place at a property in the Midlands, in the hunt for the body...

The culture of impatience and instant gratification has a lot to answer for. It has forced the hand of the property...

Local business reviews are becoming increasingly important for reputation management, with recent research showing 90% of consumers read online reviews before...

Google celebrated its 20th birthday last month. Yes, it might be hard to recall a time when it wasn’t integral in...

HM Land Registry says the full roll-out of its Local Land Charges digital register could take up to seven years, with...

Fake news has become the popular catchphrase of a certain orange-tinted president in recent years. And everyone, from tech giants like...

In our previous blog, we looked at the definitions outlined by the CPRs. In our next blog we’ll look at the...

The number of properties withdrawn from the market in the second quarter of this year was greater than the number of...

The emerging Proptech platform BestAgent has announced its latest partnership - this one is with sales progression company ViewMyChain. BestAgent, run by...

HM Land Registry calculates that 125,000 buyers will benefit from just the first phase of its digitisation programme for Local Land...

Automated search companies have heaped praise on HM Land Registry following the digitisation of local land charge data - the LLC1...

Everyone wants to rank highly on Google. Why? Well, as the world’s biggest search engine, with more than 65% market share,...

A new digital search service is being launched next month by HM Land Registry, marking the latest phase in its attempt...

London estate agency Kay & Co says it is targeting Chinese buyers following research data produced by a portal. The China property...

A property portal that describes itself as free-to-list has launched today, taking the industry by surprise - however, at least one...

Estate Agent Today understands several major national agencies and some smaller operators are involved in a project to understand why transaction...

A new study reveals precisely how little first time buyers apparently understand about the buying process.  In a survey of 500 people...

An umbrella body representing search organisations says searches “are very rarely the cause of delays” in transactions. The Council of Property Search...

The Conveyancing Association has backed the government’s calls for extensive reform of the buying and selling process, announced at the weekend. The...

The government has announced further measures which will, in its words, “professionalise” house buying and the estate agency business. In yet another Sunday...

Purplebricks has given details of how it intends to use some of its new investment, and in particular is spelling out...

Three weeks has flown by (I missed an early deadline last week - apologies) and I find myself writing the next...

HM Land Registry has taken another step towards its aim to “make conveyancing simpler, faster and cheaper” for the general public. The...

The operation of ‘online estate agencies’ has changed substantially in the relatively short few years of their existence: I have spotted...

The death of traditional TV – where viewers sit down together to watch shows at defined times – has been much...

“Are we there yet?” In the same way that these words can drive you to distraction (any parent who has endured the...

The printing industry is in the midst of a decline as digital products and services displace printed materials, which is why...

A company supplying the conveyancing industry claims that new research reveals 55 per cent of home-movers are frustrated by a lack...

The HM Land Registry has revealed more details of long-term plans to improve and speed up conveyancing processes in a five...

A search company called Big Property Data says it is working with 15 major institutions to provide automated property reports aimed...

An influential consumer group has responded to the government’s commitment to reform the house buying process by advocating legally-binding reservation agreements...

Conveyancers and the speed of local council searches have come in for criticism as details have emerged of the government’s consultation...

There has been a wide range of views from trade bodies and individual agents on the government’s surprise ‘call for evidence’...

Activity in the conveyancing market dropped significantly during the second quarter of the year, according to Search Acumen. The search provider found...

OneDome has launched a new online tool that allows users to scour Rightmove, Zoopla and OnTheMarket by setting up lifestyle criteria,...

  You’ll see a lot of 10th anniversary stories in the property industry and consumer media in the coming days: early August...

A Conservative commitment to allow more fracking is the trigger for conveyancers to gather yet more environmental information during the search...

Estate agents are angry over delays in processing land searches by a local authority in the south west. The average land search time...

Estate and letting agents' property descriptions are becoming increasingly likely to appear in keyword searches, according to a web marketing expert. Director...

Vigilant followers of the Liberal Democrats may have spotted a blog in the name of Mark Pack early yesterday morning, commenting...

What does it say on your business card? Peter Mansfield, Group Chairman, The World Property Network, www.twpn.com  and TheWorldPropertyNetwork.com                                  What is The World Property Network...

Even some of the most successful professionals from other professions fail to grasp the most important point when it comes to...

A new London-based online estate agency called Nested says it has had a “superb start” to trading, using its unusual business...

Over 60% of UK consumers think that Estate Agents’ Photos Are Very Poor To Average A recent survey* by dedicated property photo...

A sales progression tool claims to have reduced the average transaction time for a property from around 94 days to around...

Two conveyancing sector companies are claiming major advances for their products. Free2Convey, which claims to be the first conveyancing portal offering free...

Following the election of Donald Trump, there has been a rise in the number of United States investors searching for property...

Rightmove’s web traffic between Boxing Day and the end of last week is up five per cent on the same period...

In the world of property and estate agency, competition is always fierce. It’s the same when it comes to your website....

An estate agent has blasted his local council for "unacceptable" delays that mean searches can take up to 17 weeks. Mark Parker,...

All estate and letting agents now have a website – but just how effective is yours? Your 'virtual shop window' is now...

A new automated sales progression tool being launched today promises to require fewer resources from agents in return for ensuring faster...

Nearly three quarters of people who have sold or bought a property deem it more stressful than having a child or...

A search company says the introduction of new search forms aimed at making council reporting easier to understand may lead to...

A digital marketing agency says it has identified ‘top key phrases’ used by would-be buyers when they begin their property searches...

The government - which controversially launched consultation on its stamp duty surcharge between Christmas and New Year - has now used...

I recently read an article in City A.M. titled: ‘Five ways we will be buying property in 2025’ – it makes...

A fascinating report commissioned by online agency easyProperty has given the lowdown on what house buying might be like in 2020...

The days are getting longer, the sun is starting to appear on a more regular basis, Easter is just around the...

In a digital age where we have an abundance of information at our fingertips via desktops, tablets and smartphones, our attention...

An estate agent has spoken out about the threat of ‘abandoned sales’ if a completion bottleneck prevents purchases of properties going...

The Conveyancing Association is launching a training course for estate agents, as the debate swirls over whether a shortage of conveyancers...

Haart says a shortage of conveyancers and lawyers is leading to delays in transactions, made worse by the high volume of...

With the scale of devastation from flooding witnessed recently, anxiety about purchasing a property in a flood risk area is heightened....

Conveyancing search company SearchFlow has joined the attack on councils which are slow at conducting searches and threaten to delay transactions. Yesterday...

A body that regulates property searches has criticised some councils for providing “very poor service” which delays transactions. The Property Codes Compliance...

A poll of conveyancers suggests that the vast majority believe environmental searches to identify the risk of flooding will become standard...

In charitable works, as in the rest of our industry, January is a time to reflect on what’s been achieved and...

SearchFlow’s rebrand and positioning as the specialist in ‘property intelligence’ is a response to new technological advancements and the changing market...

This week, SearchFlow launches it new brand. Group Marketing and Communications Director, Maud Rousseau discusses the ethos behind the new brand...

There were 110 million visits to Rightmove on average every month in 2015. Results for the site, which measured hits from January 1...

This week, Storm Desmond has left devastation in its wake. Once again, the nation’s attention is drawn to the threat flooding...

No sooner was Halloween done and dusted than attentions turned to Christmas: shops were dressed with festive decorations; town centre lights...

The possibility of the Land Registry being amongst £4.6 billion of public assets earmarked for privatisation has provoked protests across the...

Rightmove has used its latest monthly house price index to launch its bid to push up its visits to record levels...

YourLocalAgent.com Some 91% of the public use search engines to find information every day and 91% of these always or most of...

Online estate agent SellMyHome is teaming up with local-area research information provider Property Detective to offer what it calls a “hybrid”...

Agents' Giving: No less than £20,000 has been raised at the Agents Giving Ball where Phil Spencer and 240 of the...

There's been a surge in agents letting us know about their fantastic good work - an indication of just how big...

There’s been a lot of talk lately about artificial intelligence (AI). We’ve seen it feature prominently this year on film (in...

It’s always interesting when Which? produces a report that includes estate agency. It asked 1,990 people their views on buying and selling...

Every week we publicise the efforts of estate agents and property professionals who have been working extra hard in the name...

The boss of online hybrid estate agency EweMove has hit back at what he calls “skullduggery” in comments about his firm’s...

Knight Frank says the summer is likely to be busier than expected for the sale of prime property as a result...

A number of my member firms (Bold Legal Group) have reported that, compared to three years ago, the time to get...

Estate agents in Wiltshire say chains are breaking and sales collapsing because of the length of time it takes the county...

A review of 30 prominent property sales websites undertaken by a digital marketing company demonstrates, perhaps predictably, a huge lead for...

A new portal aimed at investors looking to purchase buy-to-let property has reported that it has thousands of listings from agents...

If it is true (and who would doubt it?) that 90% of property searches start online, then how does this affect...

Information Works is a one-stop direct marketing solution allowing Clients to select individuals at over 27 million household addresses, create personalised...

Poldark, a period drama recently on the BBC, has inspired a new trend dubbed the 'Poldark Effect'.  Rather than an increase in...

It seems like every day there’s a new article about On The Market. Usually it consists something Zoopla have said, followed...