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Massive Delays In Time From Sale Agreed To Exchange/Completion

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The long slog from “sale agreed” to “completion” has become the defining frustration of the UK housing market. Ask any agent or conveyancer: deals now drift for months. 

While the exact national average varies by source and region, the trend line over five decades points one way—longer timescales, not shorter.

How long are we really talking? Historic, comparable data is patchy, but industry records and practitioner accounts offer a workable picture despite the limited ability to check substantive data:

• Mid 1970s: Typically 6–8 weeks from offer agreed to completion. Fewer checks, simpler chains, and a more standardised stock profile helped.

• Mid 1980s: Around 6–10 weeks. Bigger mortgage volumes and price booms added friction, but processes were still relatively lean.

• Circa 2000: Roughly 8–12 weeks. Email sped up communication, yet growing use of surveys, leasehold complexity, and lender panel rules nudged timelines out.

• Circa 2010: Often 12–16 weeks. Post crisis underwriting, stricter affordability checks, and more cautious valuations lengthened the path.

• Today (2024–2025): Commonly 18–22 weeks, with many transactions exceeding 24 weeks, especially in chains or where leasehold, cladding, or new build issues arise.

Why the slowdown?

Several structural forces have converged.

1. Heavier compliance and risk management. Anti money laundering and source of funds checks, politically exposed person screening, and enhanced ID verification all make sense—but they multiply the points of failure. Each actor (agent, conveyancer, lender) often repeats similar checks because systems don’t interoperate.

2. Mortgage underwriting is tougher. Since the financial crisis, lenders require deeper documentation, stress testing and more conservative valuations. Panel constraints mean not every conveyancer can act for every lender, triggering re instruction or dual representation. Mortgage offers can expire mid chain when rates move, forcing re underwriting.

3. Local search variability. Turnaround for local authority searches is a postcode lottery—from days to many weeks—stalling otherwise ready files. Add Land Registry backlogs on complex titles, and the drift accelerates.

4. Chain fragility. Low supply, stretched affordability, and tax changes affecting buy to let have made chains longer and more brittle. One down valuation or survey surprise can ripple through four or five linked sales.

5. Leasehold and building safety complexity. Managing agents’ packs (LPE1), historic ground rent clauses, and post Grenfell fire safety documentation (EWS1 and equivalents) add specialist steps and long waits. Many buyer solicitors will not proceed without gold standard evidence. In addition to this complexity causing delay, it is increasingly far more likely for a leasehold property to form part of a high percentage of chains, given the numbers that have been built over the years and the frequency which people now move.

6. Capacity and business models. High volume “factory” conveyancing struggles with spiky workloads. Caseloads per fee earner remain high, so simple queries wait days. Meanwhile, better tech exists but remains siloed. Quality conveyancing solicitors priced out due to low cost “factory” business models.

7. The increase in the ‘compensation’ culture in the UK has prevailed since the 1970’s, when rightly or wrongly back then a ‘view’ might be taken on certain aspects during the conveyancing process. These days nobody wants to take that risk anymore.

Government Intervention & A Cautionary Tale

The Labour government is making noises about overhauling the house sale process, but we encourage them not to repeat the bad history around HIPs (home Information Packs).

When the last Labour government introduced Home Information Packs (HIPs) in 2007, the stated aim was to speed sales by front loading information. In practice, they often slowed the very start. Vendors couldn’t list until a pack was ordered; costs deterred some from testing the market. Once a buyer emerged, many solicitors representing those buyers were wary of relying on HIP contents—particularly if local searches were aging by the time a chain aligned—so duplicate searches were commissioned. Within three years HIPs were suspended, leaving only the EPC requirement. The lesson isn’t that upfront information is bad; it’s that poorly designed mandates, with no shared standards or portability, create new friction rather than removing old.

What would actually help?

• Genuine upfront information—done properly. Replace one off PDFs with digital property logbooks holding title, guarantees, planning history, and searches with clear validity windows. Make data machine readable and updateable, so buyer solicitors can consume rather than repeat.

• Interoperable digital ID and source of funds. A government backed trust framework could let a single, high assurance KYC check be reused across agent, conveyancer and lender, cutting duplication and delay.

• Binding reservation agreements. Light touch, time limited pacts (with cooling off and defined penalties) reduce gazundering/gazumping and create urgency for document production. Pilots show meaningful fall through reductions.

• Service level targets where the state is the bottleneck. Publish and enforce SLAs for local searches and leasehold information packs, with fee caps and penalties for missed deadlines.

• Mortgage portability. UK “porting” exists, but fees, timing, and affordability rechecks can derail it. Loosening early repayment charges on like for like moves and exploring limited assumable loans (as in parts of the US) would cut chain length and break rate lock paralysis.

• Capacity and accountability in conveyancing. Encourage accreditation that caps active caseloads per fee earner; insist on proactive milestone reporting to all parties; promote collaborative platforms that log enquiries and responses transparently.

• Finish the job on leasehold reform. Standardise LPE1 turnaround, limit charges, and accelerate the shift away from problematic ground rent structures; commonhold where feasible will remove a chronic source of delay.

Direction Of Travel And A Plea To Government

The direction of travel is clear: the UK has layered caution upon caution without knitting systems together. That is why 6–8 weeks has quietly become four or five months. Some of that caution is justified—but the duplication isn’t.

The final word on policy is simple. Government intervention in housing, however well intentioned, can easily produce fresh problems—the HIPs episode proved as much. If ministers want to quicken sales, they should co design reforms with the people who live the process daily: estate agents, conveyancers, lenders, and local search officers. 

Listen first, legislate second, and aim for fewer, smarter steps—not more paperwork.

McCarthy Holden estate agents sold board

How to Talk to your Children about Racism and While Privilege

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talk to kids about racism

As protests continue around the world, Lauren Taylor finds out how parents can ensure their children understand what's happening.

George Floyd’s death in police custody and the subsequent protests across the world for the Black Lives Matter movement, has catapulted racism to the forefront of social consciousness.

It’s long overdue, but the outcry has forced many white people to consider and better understand systemic racism, take an honest (sometimes uncomfortable) look at white privilege, and question how they can be a better ally to black people.

For parents, there’s an added responsibility to teach children about what’s going on in the world right now and to raise kids to be racially-conscious. After all, racism and an ignorance of racial issues is a learned behaviour, and parents are the people best placed to influence their children’s understanding and ability to contribute to positive change.

But if it isn’t a topic that’s been addressed in your household before, where should you start?

talk to kids about racism

Ensure they know the wider context

Sadly school history classes don’t always cover it. “Teach them about the history of racial oppression and how racism is bigger than people having stereotypes or prejudices-it is about a system of power and is built into our laws, institutions, policies, and so forth,” says Margaret Hagerman, a professor in sociology at Mississippi State University and author of White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege in a Racially Divided America.

“This might mean parents need to do some learning in this area, and families can do this learning together.”

talk to kids about racism

Don’t teach them to ‘ignore differences’

One rhetoric you might hear is someone saying they ‘don’t see colour’ – while this might be well meaning, it actually contributes to racial bias. “Teach them how race matters in society and that being ‘colour blind’ ignores this reality,” says Hagerman.

Young children tend to be aware of visible differences between themselves and their friends, but don’t naturally discriminate – so use this in a positive way to impart anti-racist values early.

“Equality is not about pretending we don’t notice differences, but instead being aware that our differences can create barriers and working to overcome these,” says Jake Higgin, an education worker at Show Racism the Red Card (theredcard.org).

The charity works in schools and has developed a ‘home school activity worksheet’ available on their website (£20), parents can use at home. The ‘three faces’ activity asks children to look at young people with different appearances, and guess their name, nationality and religion – leading to a discussion around skin colour, identity and nationality. “It can be used as a powerful way to get young people to think about the judgements we make about others,” says Higgin.

“We have also found that young people are passionate about justice and fairness, so it’s important to get them to think about how unjust it is when people are treated poorly just because they are different.”

talk to kids about racism

Start young on the subject of white privilege

“The majority of people who find the idea of white privilege problematic or challenging, simply don’t understand it,” says Higgin. “White privilege doesn’t discount the achievements of individual white people, nor does it suggest that every single white person has what we might consider to be a ‘privileged’ life. It simply acknowledges the idea that, even in 2020, one of the biggest ways somebody can be advantaged or disadvantaged, is the colour of their skin.”

It’s never too early to teach children about their own white privilege, he says. “When we talk to young people about the ways in which they are ‘lucky’, we are discussing the advantages they might have over others in life. By getting our children to think about how others might benefit, or be held back, by the conditions of their birth, we will help them develop vital critical thinking and empathy skills.”

talk to kids about racism

Make it a safe space

Don’t just talk, make sure you listen too. “The white kids in my research had a lot of questions about race that they told me they didn’t think they could ask their parents,” says Hagerman. “Understanding what kids already know, and what conflicting messages they are trying to negotiate, is really important.”

Higgin agrees it’s important to establish a safe space: “Make sure you don’t judge anything they say or tell them they are wrong. Ask them what they know about the Black Lives Matter protests. Ask reflective, open ended questions about their feelings.”

talk to kids about racism

Develop their critical thinking

Higgin says it’s really important not to simply give children the answers. “It’s more effective to help them develop the critical thinking skills through questioning, which will allow them to better understand and evaluate the material they are presented with online and the ideas they might hear on the playground.”

Next, they need to feel empowered to act if they feel there’s a need to challenge other people’s actions. “Simply being a strong anti-racist role model within your family can be the most effective way,” he says. “By making clear your stance on discrimination at every opportunity, you will be teaching your children that racism is unacceptable and to always stand up to injustice.”

talk to kids about racism

Consider the impact of your own decisions

“White parents need to reconsider what it means to be a ‘good parent’ (i.e. getting as much as I can for my own kid) and think more about how to be a ‘good citizen’ (i.e. how can my actions contribute to the common good?)” says Hagerman.

She says to think about how you’ve designed your child’s social environment, the cues they’ll pick up from it and the wider impact that might have.

“White kids in my research learned about race as a result of interpreting patterns they observe, related to where they live [for example, moving to a very ‘white’ area], where they go to school, the media they consume, their peers, and even where they travel.”

And while it’s natural as a parent to ‘want the best’ for your child, ask if any parenting decisions you make inadvertently disadvantage others. Hagerman says during her research in the US, she found white parents often act in collective ways to maintain practices and policies within institutions that benefit their own children and, in turn, disadvantage children of colour – sociologists call this ‘opportunity hoarding’.

This, she says, “reinforces their child’s position at the top of the racial hierarchy and teaches their children lessons about what it means to navigate the world as a white person.”

George Floyd’s death feels like it could be a pivotal moment in history, and Hargerman says this moment is “an invitation to white parents not only to talk to their kids about racism, but to think about how they can act in different ways so that what they say they value, aligns with how they actually live their everyday lives.”

July Property Trading and House Sales Insight

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McCarthy Holden estate agents sold board

Self congratulatory editorial from estate agents is rarely appealing, but we’ll let it pass this time because it is refreshing to read some positive news after a July when we were bombarded with gloomy economic forecasts around the now likely no deal Brexit outcome.

A Busy Town Centre Insight

Since the beginning of 2019, house buyers have shrugged off the chaos around Brexit, and simply got on with making decisions around matters of day to day life, which are the drivers for a house move.

The trading results in July were best seen through the prism of a busy town centre branch such as our Fleet office, where two important factors leapt out of the trading activity.

Firstly, the volume of transactions which demonstrated the resilience in the residential house market, witnessed in £8.5m. worth of property exchanged in the month.

Secondly the importance of High Street showrooms, because out of the £6.5 worth of new sales added in July 75% of the buyers were local. Local factors drive the residential market, where house buying decisions are mostly made by factors such as schooling, access to work and general employment levels and family situations ranging from the three D’s (death, divorce and debt) through to the three N’s (new job, new baby, new beginnings).

If you would like a free property valuation and appraisal, go to our web site home page and click on the valuation tab.

High levels of house sales at Fleet McCarthy Holden estate agents
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