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RICS demands Government act to regulate estate agents or is this jobs for the boys and additional revenue streams for quango's? Judge for yourself?
Estate Agent Today
Wed, 8 Apr 09

RICS demands Government act to regulate estate agents

Wednesday 8th April 2009

The RICS has called on the Government to introduce ‘proper’ regulation of estate agents.

Commenting on this week’s changes to HIPs, Gillian Charlesworth, RICS director of external affairs, said: “RICS maintains that trying to engineer the home buying and selling process through the HIP is of limited use. RICS wants to see the Government achieve much more for home buyers and sellers in the form of a proper regulatory regime for estate agents.

“Currently anyone can set up as an estate agent, and when the market turns up, no doubt it will once again be an attractive place for the unscrupulous. We believe that much more will be achieved by regulating the practitioners, rather than trying to control the process.”

Her words annoyed agent Trevor Kent who said it was a fine time for the RICS to be ‘blathering’ on about licensing when huge changes to HIPs – resisted by the NAEA – had just been introduced.

However, her call follows similar criticisms of agents made by the Law Society.

There are currently moves afoot to regulate the estate agency industry from within.

Bill McClintock, who heads the board of the Ombudsman for Estate Agents scheme, property pundit Henry Pryor and former NAEA chief executive Hugh Dunsmore-Hardy are among a steering group of nine looking at a registration scheme. Other members include high-profile London agent Ed Mead of Douglas and Gordon, and Lucy Morton, the incoming president of ARLA.

The NAEA is also to introduce a licensing scheme for its members later this year, whilst ARLA unveils its licensing scheme for letting agents next month.

However, opponents of both initiatives – who include estate agents as well as the Law Society and RICS – say that the whole point of any licensing regime is that its credibility rests on it being a Government approved scheme which is completely independent of, and at an objective remove from, the industry.

Property Price News

Property asking prices fall 7 per cent

By Sharlene Goff

Published: November 17 2008 13:35 | Last updated: November 17 2008 13:35

Average asking prices for properties have fallen 7 per cent in the past year, according to Rightmove, as sellers are forced to take action to attract new buyers.

The average property was on the market for £222,979 in November, compared with £229,691 last month. This represents a monthly drop of 2.9 per cent, a sharper fall that that seen the previous month.

Rightmove said that new property sellers were keen to find a buyer before the end of the year and were therefore willing to cut their asking price.

However, asking prices still look unrealistic compared with the prices that are being achieved by sellers. Estate agents are reporting that actual sales are being agreed at around 20 per cent below peak asking prices.

Miles Shipside, commercial director at Rightmove said: “Some sellers could avoid months of disillusionment and despair if they started marketing at an asking price a lot closer to where the evidence indicates they are likely to end up. While average asking prices have fallen by 7.1% over the past year, in most parts of the country you should look to at least double that discount to achieve a sale.”

The number of new sellers continued to fall. Rightmove said there were now an average of just 20,000 a week; compared with around 35,000 this time last year.

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