Cover feature: Get a move on
In 2007, the year that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs unveiled the first iPhone, it took an average of 75 days from instructing a conveyancer to completing a home purchase.
Today, almost two decades later and despite all the ways technology has transformed our daily life, it takes an average of 120 days — an increase of 60% — according to Landmark Information Group.
In the intervening years, the smartphone has become the centre of almost everything we do. Using our phone to check a balance on a banking app or to ‘tap and pay’ is commonplace. It can answer almost any question, translate languages, convert currencies, count our daily steps and summon a taxi to the spot.
We can obtain decisions in principle within minutes but one of the biggest frustrations is the conveyancing process
Generation Z has never known any different but for those with a longer memory it is difficult to comprehend how the process of buying a home has become significantly slower while so many other processes have speeded up.
Failed attempt
“The homebuying and -selling process has not changed properly for a generation,” the housing minister told parliament. “It has not reformed in response to new technology, nor responded effectively to competition.”
The statement above is accurate, but that was not current housing minister Matthew Pennycook speaking in 2026 but instead Yvette Cooper back in 2007, the same year as the launch of the iPhone.
The Labour government of the time was preparing to introduce Home Information Packs (HIPs). These were intended to provide upfront property information to speed up transactions and reduce the number of sales falling through. But it was an ill-fated scheme. HIPs were suspended by the Coalition government in 2010 and subsequently abolished.
Today another Labour government has proposed mandatory upfront property information to tackle many of the same problems. It appears that policymakers have gone full circle, but housing experts argue that the technology and infrastructure available now mean that the reforms have much greater potential to succeed this time around.
Conveyancers do not feel able to start providing these new services unless instructed by their clients to do so
The consensus about the pressing need for change is strong. The Open Property Data Association (OPDA) estimates that housing transactions that collapse after an offer has been accepted cost the economy up to £1.97bn a year in wasted fees, time and productivity. Government research suggests that about one in three purchases falls through.
Aside from the direct costs to consumers, delays and failed transactions have broader ramifications for the housing market. Buyers can lose money spent on surveys and legal fees, chains can unravel and mortgage offers can expire. The OPDA found that 66% of recent homemovers had been put off moving again by their experience of the process.
That reluctance to move also has wider implications. In April 2026, MPs on the Housing, Communities and Local Government committee warned that the ordeal of moving was discouraging homeowners from selling — including older people living in a large property that no longer suited them.
This in turn restricted the availability of homes for other buyers, the MPs said.
Big frustration
Rosewood Hall founder and director Nadeen Hall has witnessed the transformation of the mortgage process during her 25 years in the industry. However, the legal side has failed to keep pace, she says.
Tech is not the problem. It is the fact that the adoption of tech is not yet where we need it to be
“When I started, mortgage applications involved mountains of paperwork, fax machines and waiting for days, sometimes weeks, for decisions,” recalls Hall. “Today, we can obtain decisions in principle within minutes, submit applications electronically and, in some cases, receive mortgage offers in under 24 hours.
“But, for me, one of the biggest frustrations in our industry is the conveyancing process.”
The government’s response to its committee’s warnings came in June, with a ‘roadmap’ intended to cut transaction times by around four weeks, reduce fall-throughs and save first-time buyers an average of £650.
Upfront property packs sit at the core of the proposals contained in the ‘Home buying and selling reform roadmap’. Sellers would assemble a sales pack before listing — including searches, title information and a property condition report —rather than leave the buyer’s conveyancer to uncover potential problems after an offer had been accepted.
The government also wants transactions to become binding sooner, once buyers have enough information to commit. The housing committee pointed to Scotland, where contracts become binding at an earlier stage and only around 9% of sales fall through, although the process differs in other respects too.
About 90% of cases should be fairly standard, but too many firms use problems affecting a minority of transactions to justify delays across the board
Change is to be phased in, with the government initially encouraging voluntary adoption before making digital sales packs and logbooks mandatory. It also intends to legislate for secure property data sharing.
Legal complications
Making reliable property information available earlier should help conveyancers identify potential problems before the latter derail a sale. But it will not remove the legal issues themselves, some of which have become considerably more complex over the past two decades.
The leasehold scandal has exposed escalating ground rents, high service charges, short leases and other onerous clauses that can leave homes difficult to mortgage or sell. Building safety legislation and remediation costs following the Grenfell Tower tragedy have brought additional checks.
This has contributed to a widening gap between freehold and leasehold transaction times. Research by Connells Group found that leasehold properties took an average of 58 days longer than freeholds to reach exchange in April 2026 — the widest difference on record.
Some lender panel requirements remain geared towards traditional law firms, creating unnecessary obstacles for newer businesses
The researchers pointed to increased legal requirements and delays involving managing agents.
Leasehold reform has been a priority for successive housing secretaries, including the Conservatives’ Michael Gove, who championed changes that led to the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024.
Labour is taking forward further proposals to curb ground rents and make commonhold the default for new flats. In the meantime, its homebuying roadmap promises to address the lengthy time taken and the fees charged by freeholders and managing agents when supplying information needed for a sale.
Conveyancing Association director of delivery Beth Rudolf says the way legal work is organised compounds the delays. Traditionally, the seller’s conveyancer has had no reason to check the title at the outset, while the buyer’s lawyer has had to wait for the contract pack before beginning enquiries. Searches, mortgage instructions and valuations could then generate successive rounds of questions, with information arriving and being reviewed at different stages.
Rudolf believes reviewing the information all together would make a significant difference, but says conveyancers need clients to instruct them to carry out the work earlier.
We’ve built a law firm around a process we think makes sense for the consumer today, as opposed to building a platform for an existing law firm
“The biggest practical issue is that conveyancers do not feel able to start providing these new services unless instructed by their clients to do so,” she says.
Rudolf wants the Law Society’s Conveyancing Quality Scheme protocol to encourage solicitors to prepare and review sales packs earlier, giving sellers the opportunity to resolve problems before marketing their property.
Lack of integration
OPDA chair Maria Harris believes a lack of integration between different organisations’ systems is another major obstacle. Lenders, brokers, estate agents, surveyors and conveyancers often need the same information, but their systems cannot always communicate. Many organisations have yet to digitise their records in a consistent format.
“Tech is not the problem. It is the fact that the adoption of tech is not yet where we need it to be,” says Harris.
She points to Open Banking as an example of how organisations can share information securely using common data standards.
Some transactions that use digital property packs and shared data standards have reached exchange in as little as 15 days
In fact, the OPDA is developing a framework to enable property information to move between systems without repeated manual checks. Harris says the government intends to mandate the new standards by 2029, with the OPDA’s smart property data scheme operational by 2030.
A voluntary accreditation scheme, expected by the end of 2027, will give firms an opportunity to prepare ahead of the mandatory requirements.
Digital identity checks offer another opportunity to eliminate duplication. Rather than providing identification separately to estate agents, brokers, lenders and conveyancers, buyers could share confirmation that their identity had already been verified to the required standard.
However, Harris acknowledges that moving searches and legal checks to the beginning of a transaction will also require firms to rethink when they charge their customers. Some existing revenue streams, including charges for repeatedly ordering checks and documents, could disappear.
‘Chasing legals’
One Mortgage System chief executive Dale Jannels believes conveyancers have been particularly slow to adapt to technological change.
“We get an offer out in a minute but then it sits around for 25 weeks,” he says. “I hear the team chasing legals all the time.”
He has seen cases where one solicitor going on annual leave can bring progress to a halt, with nobody else available to take over.
You do need time [as the client] to understand the transaction. You need to get your head around it. You need to make sure it’s right for you
Jannels suspects that traditional working practices and, in some specialist cases, financial incentives may discourage change. However, he acknowledges that many straightforward conveyancing transactions operate on fixed fees.
Conveyd co-founder and chief executive Manasi Kulkarni challenges the industry’s tendency to blame delays on external factors.
Although she acknowledges that searches, managing agents and other conveyancers can all hold up transactions, she believes these obstacles can usually be anticipated and managed more efficiently.
Kulkarni estimates that less than 10% of cases involve genuinely complex legal problems, such as the need for a lease extension.
“About 90% of cases should be fairly standard,” she says, arguing that too many firms use problems affecting a minority of transactions to justify delays across the board.
Conveyd has built its law firm around technology, rather than adding software to existing processes. It uses automation and artificial intelligence to gather information and handle administration, enabling lawyers to concentrate on decisions requiring their legal expertise.
We get an offer out in a minute but then it sits around for 25 weeks. I hear the team chasing legals all the time
“We’ve built a law firm around a process we think makes sense for the consumer today, as opposed to building a platform for an existing law firm,” explains Kulkarni.
She puts the firm’s average transaction time at around 35 days.
Kulkarni also argues that the wider industry needs to accommodate new ways of working. She says some lender panel requirements remain geared towards traditional law firms, creating unnecessary obstacles for newer businesses.
‘Speed to certainty’
The progress already being made by some firms suggests the government’s ambition to cut four weeks from the process need not be the limit.
Harris says some transactions that use digital property packs and shared data standards have reached exchange in as little as 15 days. For her, the priority is “speed to certainty”, with buyers and sellers establishing that their transaction is legally secure much earlier, then choosing a completion date that suits their circumstances.
But sometimes a little friction is desirable in the process, as demonstrated by the 14-day cooling-off period that applies to many consumer contracts.
We can obtain decisions in principle within minutes, submit applications electronically and, in some cases, receive mortgage offers in under 24 hours
Jannels agrees that around two weeks would be a sensible target for straightforward home purchases, giving buyers time to consider such a significant commitment.
“You need to understand it. You need to get your head around it. You need to make sure it’s right for you,” he says.
Nearly 20 years after HIPs promised to speed up home moves, most of those involved in the sector do not want to see buyers rushed through one of the most important decisions of their life.
The goal is to spare them not just months of limbo while they wait to find out whether their purchase will go ahead but also substantial losses if it fails.
This article featured in the November 2026 edition of Mortgage Strategy.
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