June 1st rapidly approaches and with it the mandatory introduction of the Home Inspection Pack (HIP) but without one of its most contentious contents. The Home Condition Report (HCR) will now not be mandatory but only voluntary. Why any seller would willingly pay several hundred pounds to commission a report that could scupper his chances of a sale remains a mystery to me. Although this nanny state tries to control everything the citizen does, thank goodness “caveat emptor” - let the buyer beware - still applies. Government indicates it would like the HCR to become mandatory in the future but it seems unlikely that this will occur.

All the other ingredients of the HIP remain including, bizarrely enough, the Energy Report which will rank houses like refrigerators or washing machines - presumably those qualified as Home Inspectors who aren't suing the Government having spent thousands of pounds qualifying for a job that doesn't exist, will be able to do these reports. Quite what this will achieve is debatable: a modern house is built to stringent insulation standards whereas it is fairly obvious that a seventeenth century house will not have cavity insulation (or even cavity walls!). A peek in the loft will tell if the void has been insulated; a building survey can ascertain the age of the boiler and whether the wiring and plumbing is up to scratch.

Getting all the other information together - guarantees, permissions, building regulation approvals and even searches is very sensible and what most intelligent sellers do anyway (perhaps not a search - how long does it remain valid?) so the HIP does have benefits. Get ready for an influx of property on the market in May and not much afterwards. At least the nonsensical HCR will disappear and estate agents, vendors and solicitors can breathe a sigh of relief!

Martin Boughton