Home Information Packs....

Just what is the ****ing point of laying out over £200 for one of these* when no one pays any attention to them and solicitors prefer to do their own searches anyway....?? I feel royally shafted.

* Apart from the fact that there's a legal requirement for them....

Just what is the ****ing point of laying out over £200 for one of these* when no one pays any attention to them and solicitors prefer to do their own searches anyway....?? I feel royally shafted.

 

 

* Apart from the fact that there's a legal requirement for them....

We're just copying the Yanks.

They'll be redundant by the next General Election.

Just what is the ****ing point of laying out over £200 for one of these* when no one pays any attention to them and solicitors prefer to do their own searches anyway....?? I feel royally shafted.

We 'went to market' a few months back, and 'forgot' to get one.

The agent took us off their books after about a month as we hadn't got a HIP. Too ****ing right we didn''t, they sent 3 of their mates in the first week (so bloody obvious that it was laughable), then absolutely zilch.

And for that reason I am out!

I think the principle's right - the execution has just been wrong.

In the past, I've put in an offer for a property, paid some legal fees, only to find that the searches and surveys threw up stuff to put me off buying. So I'd wasted money that I couldn't recover but then had to fork out again when I looked at an alternative property. Particularly pertinent for first-time buyers IMO.

Total waste of my money.

I think the principle's right - the execution has just been wrong.

 

In the past, I've put in an offer for a property, paid some legal fees, only to find that the searches and surveys threw up stuff to put me off buying. So I'd wasted money that I couldn't recover but then had to fork out again when I looked at an alternative property. Particularly pertinent for first-time buyers IMO.

That's fair enough, but the people that do the HIPs aren't qualified surveyors anyway so you'd still need to get a proper survey done in any case, and the searches don't appear to be trusted as solicitors end up doing their own anyway. But yes, I think the principle is right, but make sure the execution is right before making it law to need one and getting people to shell out loads of money on top of surveys, stamp duties, etc. that they still need to get.

That's fair enough, but the people that do the HIPs aren't qualified surveyors anyway so you'd still need to get a proper survey done in any case, and the searches don't appear to be trusted as solicitors end up doing their own anyway. But yes, I think the principle is right, but make sure the execution is right before making it law to need one and getting people to shell out loads of money on top of surveys, stamp duties, etc. that they still need to get.

Solicitors wouldn't 'trust' them, would they. Think about it - it is supposed to simplify and speed up the process. That's the last thing solicitors want

What is even worse is the number of 'training' companies offering to train people to do HIPs for an exhorbitant sum and 'guaranteeing' work. Er, hello! There's no work out there ATM - there's a housing slow-down. Shylocks, the lot of them.

Solicitors wouldn't 'trust' them, would they. Think about it - it is supposed to simplify and speed up the process. That's the last thing solicitors want

Hadn't thought of that....And I'm normally such a scrooge when it comes to things like this.

I suppose the only thing I can offer in defence of this is that if the solicitor is offering the rest of the service for a house move, perhaps they'd be more confident that the searches they did were right. I know what I'm like if I ask someone to trawl through data using SQL or something....when the results come back I invariably do 'em again just to check them!!!!

Solicitors wouldn't 'trust' them, would they. Think about it - it is supposed to simplify and speed up the process. That's the last thing solicitors want

 

What is even worse is the number of 'training' companies offering to train people to do HIPs for an exhorbitant sum and 'guaranteeing' work. Er, hello! There's no work out there ATM - there's a housing slow-down. Shylocks, the lot of them.

To be fair, one of my staff had saved up and paid the exhorbitant fee to do one of those courses.

Fair play to the company that was running it, as the cancelled the course and refunded all the money. They also said they would never be running the course again as HIPs were to be scrapped - not sure how true that is though :smt102