Burning Issue: Was SNP right to press ahead with Home Reports in this economic climate?

Published on Monday 1 December 2008 23:20

Yes STUART McMILLAN SNP MSP

THE SNP has taken real action to support Scotland's housing market. As the full impact of the credit crunch has been felt, the Scottish Government was ahead of the game, bringing forward 100 million of investment in affordable housing and establishing a 25 million homeowners' support fund to keep people in their homes and away from the threat of repossession. This is real action to support housing in difficult times.

Home Reports will deliver a benefit to buyers and sellers – a clear guide to the property, its energy efficiency and its condition for all prospective purchasers, allowing buyers to make bids based on real information about the property they wish to buy. In contrast to the picture presented, Home Reports are being accepted by banks and mortgage lenders.

The housing market depends on first-time buyers making that investment in a home of their own and they should be able to do so in the knowledge that they are bidding a fair price for a good property.

For first-time buyers – many of whom have stayed out of the market as prices soared – the chance to buy a property without the added expense of a survey is one that will appeal as prices return to affordable levels.

Similarly, almost all sellers are also buyers so in providing a home report as the seller, most will also receive the benefit of a Home Report as a buyer. Energy reports, one of the three parts to the Home Report, will be a European Union requirement from January – they are also a positive move for Scotland's housing stock.

The three components of a survey mean people make better, more informed choices.

No

DAVID McLETCHIE

Scottish Conservative chief whip and solicitor

HOME Reports are an expensive, useless luxury we can well do without. They are a disaster waiting to hit the Scottish housing market whose full impact will be felt in the new year, when homes traditionally go on the market for spring sales. I am in no doubt our already fragile property market will be further damaged by their introduction.

A number of major lenders will not accept the property valuation in a Home Report as the basis for granting a home loan. Accordingly, instead of a single survey, we are now back to multiple surveys, the alleged problem that Home Reports were meant to solve.

Every seller in Scotland is now being saddled with a bill of up to 800 and it looks as if many buyers will still have to pay for a separate valuation survey on top of this. Frankly, this is no time to be burdening both sellers and buyers with expensive bureaucratic requirements.

Not only was the Home Report pilot a total flop, but their cost has soared by over a third from the initial estimate and the Scottish Consumer Council admits it will hit the lowest paid the hardest. The housing industry is crying out for help and homeowners are worried about the value of their properties – they do not need the hindrance of a costly and unwanted Home Report, which has a limited shelf life.

It beggars belief that the SNP government has gone ahead with this scheme, which it inherited from its Labour/Liberal Democrat predecessors and which only the Scottish Conservatives opposed. It has had ample opportunities to, at the very least, postpone the introduction of Home Reports until the housing market settles down, but has stubbornly refused to do so.