Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of taking steps to speed up the conveyancing process for property sales.

The Government recognises that the current home buying and selling process in England is slow, costly and stressful, and that conveyancing can contribute to this. An improved, modernised process could benefit consumers, industry, the housing market and the wider economy.

A key part of the conveyancing process is obtaining search information from the relevant local authority. To speed up this process HM Land Registry are digitising search data held by local authorities. Eventually this will cover each local authority and provide a quick and accurate response, potentially taking weeks off transaction times. More information can be found here.

We continue to consider how to drive improvements most effectively across home buying and selling for both consumers and the sector.