House sellers may soon be required to disclose any issues related to damp or flooding in gardens under new policy proposals aimed at revitalizing the UK property market, reports BritPanorama.
The UK government is considering reforms to enhance the availability of property surveys for potential buyers, addressing concerns that many sales collapse late in the process due to undisclosed problems revealed by surveys.
The proposed measures could include making previous survey results accessible to prospective buyers, a move designed to expedite transactions that currently take an average of five months from offer acceptance to completion. This duration is significantly longer than in several other countries.
Last week, newly appointed Housing Secretary Steve Reed emphasized a commitment to construction, declaring “build baby build” as the government’s primary focus. However, he faces mounting challenges as the number of new homes built in England dropped to 201,000 in the year ending June 2025, an 8% decrease from the previous year.
In a positive development, applications for new home construction outside London surged by 49% in the first half of the year compared to 2024. Nonetheless, hitting the ambitious target of 1.5 million new homes by 2029 remains a daunting task for Reed and his team.
