The Mini Budget erodes any 'normality' in the conveyancing sector

In light of everything that has happened at the tail-end of September, and the outlook looking forward, that ‘back to the future’ trend looks likely to escalate, given the tumultuous period we are currently enduring.

It’s difficult to second-guess when this might be published/read, however it looks likely that there is plenty more to come out in the wash in terms of mortgage lenders, their pricing, their pulling of products, and the overall impact this will have on so much and so many within the sector.

I don’t want to dwell too much on the political catalyst that caused this, not least because again by the time you read this who knows how much or how little the Government will have rode back on the measures announced in its ‘Mini Budget'.

However, suffice to say that I can think of no other series of Government-announced measures which have had such a significant impact on our sector, and not in a good way. It remains to be seen whether we get a u-turn, or indeed Conservative MPs decide that the Finance Bill cannot be agreed to, but needless to say my view is that we need action, we need to see the costings behind these measures, and we need a series of actions which calm the markets and show the ‘workings out’.

The longer we wait for that, and it’s not supposed to be delivered until November, the more likely we will see further uncertainty, further mortgage price rises and/or lenders choosing not to come back to market until they can get a firm handle on what their pricing should actually be.

For the conveyancing sector, the impact has been enormous. Understandably, swathes of those going through the purchase/remortgage process have been contacting their conveyancing firms asking what the current situation is and how it could be impacted.

Unfortunately, there have been a number of mixed messages put out into the media, perhaps the most disruptive being a belief that lenders were somehow pulling agreed mortgage offers, rather than just pulling product/changing rates for new business.

I know for a fact that many conveyancing firms have spent a huge amount of resource reassuring both purchases and sellers in this spot, in terms of whether they are still able to rely upon the mortgage they agreed. At a time when resource was already stretched thin, this was clearly not an ideal moment to create a situation where conveyancers had to spend a significant amount of time and resource responding to phone calls/emails seeking clarification.

Again, a case of the Government shooting the housing market in its foot. Conveyancing firms have spent a lot of time over the past six months in particular looking at ways to improve the time to completion, and to bring efficiencies to the process. As well as utilising staff in the best way possible, while also trying to bring on new resource to deal with demand. To have created a situation which took away from all that effort is I think pretty unforgiveable.

However, that is the hand we have been dealt, and I know that all the firms on the Broker Conveyancing panel will continue to work flat out and to provide all the reassurance that clients need in this situation.

At the moment, this is I’m afraid the current ‘normal’ and it is to be hoped that action continues to be taken in order to bring the mortgage and housing market back to a place which resembles what, we all know, it should actually look like. That means (hopefully) rates stabilising, products launched back into market, and a greater degree of options particularly for those coming to the end of deals who will undoubtedly be worried about severe ‘payment shock’.

For advisers no doubt swamped with concerned clients – both existing and new – I have the highest regard as they seek to deliver solutions which create the least financial harm. We as a distributor, and the firms we work with, will continue to be ultra-focused on helping these clients get through the process in as quick a time as possible in order to give them the certainty they deserve.