New Sales Process Launched for Residential Leasehold Properties in the UK

This article by the Property Wire on October 10th, 2013 discusses the introduction of a new sales process welcomed by the British Property Federation.

The British Property Federation has welcomed the introduction of a new property sales process which will reduce leasehold transaction times by five to 10 days and save UK consumers a combined total of over a million days each year.
 
The new process, based on a standardised questionnaire for the industry has been created by the BPF and all the major trade bodies, including The Law Society and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), facilitated by Move with Us, and will be available to all parties in the process.

The BPF pointed out that buyers and sellers of leasehold properties have experienced added complications and expensive delays because of differing information requirements from both the buyer’s and seller’s conveyancers meaning the landlord or managing agent has to deal with a different set of enquiries every time a leasehold property is sold.

By creating an approved set of enquiries for leasehold properties both landlords and managing agents can introduce systems to collate the information safe in the knowledge that both the buyer’s and seller’s conveyancers will accept it, saving an estimated five to 10 working days on average. Consumers will also save money as the additional requests for information will only be required where an issue is revealed which requires further investigation.

‘It is great to see that the whole residential leasehold sector pulling together and delivering a benefit to its customers,’ said Ian Fletcher, director of policy at the British Property Federation.

‘The commercial leasehold sector has had standard enquiries for 10 years and seen the advantages flowing from a more efficient conveyancing process. The same will be true of these residential enquiries and we will be promoting them amongst our membership as the standard for the sector,’ he added.

The new industry created and approved Leasehold Property Enquiries, Form LPE1 will be available from 10 October and the overall concept has been approved by the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) and The Building Societies Association (BSA).

Landlords, managing agents and conveyancers interested in accessing the new leasehold enquiries form should contact Beth de Montjoie Rudolf at Move with Us.

Article Source: http://www.propertywire.com/news/europe/uk-leaeshold-property-sales-201310108334.html