HIPS - The Estate Agents Nightmare?

Link Up Properties Head Office brings you the lowdown on Home Information Packs....

Agents' thinking shifting — but lenders ‘need to gear up'

JUST OVER 17 months and counting — the Government has announced that Home Information Packs will be a mandatory part of every home sale from June 1, 2007 and already there has been a change in the thinking of estate agents.

That is the view of National Association of Estate Agents chief executive Peter Bolton King, who has been delighted to see packed attendances at a series of HIP ‘road shows' being held around the country by the NAEA and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors to brief agents on how to prepare for the Packs.

“Before the date was announced, the main plea we heard from agents was for us to ‘help make the Packs go away', but now it is ‘what will it mean for me?

“So the date being announced has focused attention and we have to get on with preparing for life in a post-HIPs environment, when I believe agents' professional skills will come to the fore and the bar will be raised in terms of knowledge and expertise. So the Packs can, I feel, have a positive effect on our profession.”

The NAEA initially expressed surprise that the date was announced by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister without more notice being given to them and other key stakeholders — and that the date for mandatory introduction wasn't scheduled for a quieter time of year.

But now Mr Bolton King is stressing the urgency of the need for agents to have their say on the draft regulations before the December 31 deadline. “HIPs are coming — so it is vital that as many of us as possible have our say,” he said.

Meanwhile, the anti-Packs pressure group SPLINTA, backed by an increasing number of leading agents, are still hopeful of persuading the ODPM to reconsider the measure and the Law Society have joined a host of companies in announcing they will supply Packs.

But a key figure at a leading agency has urged mortgage lenders to switch on to mandatory Packs being only months away.

“I have had several conversations with lenders recently where the subject of sourcing valuations in a post-HIPs world was not even on the agenda,” said Mike Rowley, managing director of Connells Survey & Valuation. “HIPs have been talked about for so long that many companies are thinking it won't happen and burying their head in the sand. The facts are that we know when it will happen, what will be in the Pack and most importantly what will be in the Home Condition Report. There is no excuse for not being prepared.