ARTICLE BY: Regional and Bespoke Housebuilders Forum

For many Forum members, the time between reservation and exchange can be fraught. Buyers’ circumstances may change, mortgage offers have deadlines and delays of a few weeks can put a sale at risk of falling through. Local searches are often part of that wait and for smaller developers, the effect of a stalled sale is greater.

New Homes Searches by Move Reports UK, a Midlands-based independent search company working across the UK, offers an approach designed to simplify the process. Rather than each buyer’s conveyancer ordering searches individually, the searches are prepared in advance for the development and made available to download alongside the contract pack.

For housebuilders, this means greater control over timescales. Searches are ready from day one, so conveyancers have what they need earlier in the process. The searches are tailored to new build conveyancing, and Move Reports says there are no site set-up or preparation costs and that fees are only payable on exchange.

The approach has been used on developments by both large and smaller housebuilders, as well as in the affordable housing sector, which suggests it can work at the scale many of our members build at.

Move Reports’ Chairman, Richard Bray, brings more than 20 years’ experience in the property search industry. He sat on the government working group behind the Home Information Pack legislation and is an Executive member and Board Director of CoPSO, the Council of Property Search Organisations, which oversees the industry’s Search Code. He also sits on industry and government working groups looking at how to speed up conveyancing.

Some Forum members are already working with New Homes Searches. Others, who would like to explore whether the approach could work on their sites can contact Move Reports at newhomes@movereportsuk.com. For further information visit www.newhomessearches.com

“We now have a specialist New Homes orientated search provider on board who absolutely understands the space, and the urgency. They are called Move Reports UK” – Connells Group