Home Sellers and Buyers set to pay more if the home information pack is abolished

The Hip Reform Group has today warned home owners that they are likely to face increased cost and delayed transactions if the Conservative Party proceeds with its intention to ‘scrap’ home information Packs;

HRG’s spokesman, Solicitor, David Pett explains:

‘The Conservative Party’ policy is focused solely on the removal of the HIP, with little, if any, detail on what this will leave behind, and, more importantly mean for the home owner. Grant Shapps would like the electorate to think this will make the cost of moving home cheaper. This is simply not the case – on the contrary the seller and buyer will see an immediate increase in the cost of property searches and will be left having to pay much more when moving home. The irony is that without the HIP the consumer will be a lot worse off’

The main reason for the increase is the rise in the cost of personal property searches, as according to Alan Thorogood, Chief Executive of STL Group plc, the average cost of the property searches has come down by 42% since the introduction of home information packs. These figures have been obtained by analyzing audits undertaken by the industry trade bodies COPSO and AHIPP and in discussion with a number of local authorities.

He explains the reason for this:

“The c 40% price reduction since HIPs is largely due to lower fees charged by personal search companies due to a smaller amount of specialist HIP providers commanding high market share. Lately, competition due to lower transaction volumes and the effect of the April 2009 Charging Regulations have played a significant factor re pricing. The Charging Regulations introduced the concept of ‘cost recovery’ of local authority data. This has reduced the cost of many council searches and, whilst the cost of local authority data for personal searches has actually increased, personal search prices have not increased significantly due to increased competition pressures’

In addition to added cost, the consumer will also, according to Mr Pett, be exposed to the potential of further loss associated with the return of increased abortive sales, as well as the stress of longer sale transactions.