"Advisers in particular appear to be taking more control of the conveyancing service they offer"
You might anticipate that it will look very different to years gone by, but actually viewing the market currently, it’s possible to see a number of pointers which are not that different to years gone by.
One thing that may well have surprised many economists and commentators – certainly over the last couple of years – is the resilience of the UK property market in terms of activity and transaction levels.
Of course, there were numerous factors influencing this, not least the post-pandemic urge to move and a stamp duty holiday to take advantage of, however as time has progressed that demand (and activity levels) have stayed solid.
It remains to be seen just what the next year and a half will bring, and there is good reason to expect a dampening of activity due to the cost of living increases and inflation impacting on demand, but there is also an argument to suggest these very issues will contribute to transactions remaining solid.
How many homeowners might feel the need to downsize in the near future? How many might feel the need to act as their financial position changes?
It was a point made by Search Acumen in its Conveyancing Market Tracker, and it also highlighted how a levelling out of house prices might also entice more buyers into the market as properties, previously out of reach, come within their grasp.
The fundamentals of supply and demand however do appear to show that, even if house prices do dip slightly, then the idea of a ‘house price crash’ seem somewhat far-fetched.
Overall, there appears to be a positive outlook for both purchasing, and particularly remortgaging, in our market. Again, what you might call a ‘normal’ market for the UK which has tended to see remortgage activity dominant.
In conveyancing too, we appear to be seeing a resumption of the trends that were apparent pre-pandemic. Again, looking at the Search Acumen data, we can see a return to dominance of the larger conveyancing specialist operators taking the bulk of the business. This, after a time, when many more firms took on conveyancing work during the stamp duty holiday period as a result of the greater levels of activity.
Now, this most recent data shows the 500 largest conveyancing firms accounted for 59% of all transactions completed in the second quarter of this year. That was the highest level since Q2 2020 which effectively covered the first lockdown period.
In other words, the bigger specialists are handling more of the work available – the top 50 firms on their own completed over one in five (21%) transactions during the quarter. This was the highest figure since records began over a decade ago in 2011, and perhaps tells you something about where we are heading back to.
Advisers in particular appear to be taking more control of the conveyancing service they offer their clients, and this tends to favour the larger specialists who have the knowledge, expertise and resources to cope with these cases.
On the subject of resources, you’ll be acutely aware that many firms in the property market have struggled in terms of this during 2022, but it has been positive to see conveyancing growth in this area lately. O’Neill Patient, for example, recently said it had increased its capacity for conveyancing by over 30% during this year, and I’m aware of other firms on our panel doing exactly the same.
This focus on returning to the specialists means the number of active conveyancing firms has dropped back to below 4,000. One of the major trends of the last decade has been a drop in active firms – the pandemic briefly changed this but we appear to be moving back to the norm now, and I would anticipate specialist conveyancers will continue to grow market share at the expense of the smaller operators.
Overall, these market norms reasserting themselves are good news for advisers, particularly those who are active in providing conveyancing advice, and those who can forge strong relationships, through platforms like Broker Conveyancing, with the more specialist operators.
Clients will want to know they are in the hands of experienced conveyancing professionals – particularly as cases become more complex – and it will be entirely normal for advisers to be the conduit for this.
