Caesar and Howie elder statesman Ivor Klayman has written to his constituency MSP Mike Pringle, outlining his concerns about the "disastrous error both practically and politically" in instituting Home Reports in December 2008.

The introduction of the reports, he says, is "conspiring to wreck completely our already very fragile house market and the thousands of jobs which rely on it. We are witnessing, I fear, the biggest debacle in the property market in living memory." Klayman calls for action in the best interests of local people, despite any party allegiance.

"I would hope that you are of sufficient independence of mind to speak up for your constituents at a time of severe crisis. Please be a part of the solution, not of the silent majority who are fiddling whilst a major part of the Scottish economy burns," he said. 

Klayman, a well known and respected figure in central belt conveyancing, copied his letter to the Firm in response to the publication of our Home Reports supplement this month, which included guidance and comment from surveyors, the ESPC, GSPC, the Scottish Government and professors Stewart Brymer and Lorne Crerar, both of whom advocated the introduction of the reports.

"It seems a pity that the HITF do not appear to have contemplated what effect Home Reports might have in a falling market let alone the kind of market (or lack of market) we have now," Klayman told the Firm.

"I attach the text of a letter which I have sent to my local MSPs which I think in the numbered paragraphs says all that need by said in relation to Home Reports about the present state of the market . This is one area of criticism which was not tackled by Professor Crerar in his article. I am sure he would value the opportunity of commenting on it now."

Ivor Klayman's letter in full reads as follows:

As one of your constituents and as a practising property solicitor with 40 years experience I have decided I can no longer keep silent. The reason is quite simple: I believe that the Scottish Government has passed legislation without proper consultation, after ignoring its own pilot which showed a complete lack of interest in the proposed Home Reports, (HR) a disastrous error both practically and politically which, combined with the unprecedented economic crisis affecting the world today in general and the property market in Scotland in particular, is conspiring to wreck completely our already very fragile house market and the thousands of jobs which rely on it. We are witnessing, I fear, the biggest debacle in the property market in living memory. Only the low amount of actual HR instructions hides the complete shambles of the suppliers and the lack of preparation and training for such a big change by the surveyors themselves. Even if I thought HR a good idea, the execution is pathetic.

We now have the obscene situation of sellers paying £900 to be told their skirting boards are scuffed. What the consumer lobby and the Government have signally failed to appreciate it that the more minute disclosure you get on what was essentially caveat emptor for centuries, the less people will buy as they will be scared off by apparent problems which merit a mention in a single survey (SS) but which a purchaser’s surveyor wouldn’t have dreamed of wasting time over in the past.

Failed DG units seem to be a part of our culture ie misted windows where the seals have perished allowing damp air into the vacuum where it condenses into beads of water which are trapped within the 2 panes of glass. I reckon 60% of houses have at least one – would you now buy a house if the SS made a great play of that and as a seller would you feel obliged to replace it? If the answer is no to either then you lose purchasers from the very market which is in its death throes.

After only a couple of weeks the storm clouds are gathering and I feel it is my duty to point out some facts which, whilst hard to swallow for a legislature which has thundered, heedless of anything but the siren cries of the consumer lobby and those with interests in HR, in the pursuit of popularity, are nonetheless demonstrable:-

1. The most recent statistics available to me to end November 2008 indicate a 70% reduction in volume house sales throughout East Central Scotland including Forth Valley. Those few properties which do sell are taking on average over 15 weeks to sell, but the vast majority are not selling and remain on the market for many months – the snow in the photos on some sales schedules is from last winter. Redundancies are commonplace from estate agents, solicitors, banks, building societies, surveyors and any business associated with the property market. There is misery in our communities as never before.

2. Multiple surveys (one of the reasons for the introduction of Home Reports) are and have been for years a thing of the past since the introduction of standard clause offers with subject to survey clauses in 2005. Even before then, the only clients “suffering” multiple surveys I ever experienced were in Edinburgh and Glasgow when a much sought after property was being offered for sale and even then copies of survey reports could be bought from surveyors for a reduced fee. At no point in my career have I had a client who had more than a handful of surveys carried out before being successful (this is not the south east of England after all) and even then it did not deter them from persevering. But we are talking about a different age where surveys were carried out before offering.

3. For centuries we operated a system of caveat emptor where the purchaser bought the house warts and all whilst reducing the price if potential repairs justified it to reflect the current condition assessed by a surveyor acting for the buyer only. The new system, which was not seriously tested, now by its focus on the purchaser’s rights makes it difficult for a seller to market a property which may need repairs for fear of producing a HR which has off-putting comments about condition. So a selling client faced with having to reduce his price perhaps as a result of a crisis sale (redundancy, mortgage arrears or whatever) now has to spend anything from £350 to £1,500 on a HR and then more on repairs just to give himself an even chance of selling in this terrible climate. The days of the speculative seller have now ended and that effect should not be underestimated. Before the imposition of the Home Reports, a seller could test the market and decide whether to persevere or sit tight – who now is going to spend £1,000 to do that? Transaction numbers are already dropping as are properties coming on the market. Our own house valuers’ diaries were full of appointments before 1st December but now they are empty and the reason we are given in nearly every sale enquiry we receive which does not proceed is the cost of a HR.

4. The insistence on implementation by the Scottish Government disturbs me. Despite there being a chorus of protests about the lack of details as regards price, costs of updating HRs, their shelf-life and which lenders would accept them (and not insist on their own survey reports), information only became partially available in the week before the Government pressed on without any consideration for, and as if insulated from, the chaos in the property market. The predictable happened – (a) there was a rush by sellers to get their properties marketed in the last week of November (up 50% on normal take on levels) and (b) potential sellers have this month indicated that they will stay put as they fear what a HR might say or because they simply cannot afford an average outlay of £750 for a house valued at below £100,000 (comprising marketing fee plus VAT, ESPC insertion fee of £200-250 and HR cost of £350 plus).

5. The criminalisation of the house selling process is nothing short of a national scandal. To be faced with a series of £500 fines (one for each request for a HR which is unavailable) allied to a criminal record for failure to comply with this untried and untested system shows a callous disregard for the good people of Scotland who clearly cannot be trusted voluntarily to obtain HRs where the seller agrees it is a good idea for him or alternatively to agree with his purchaser that the purchaser will get his own report. The choice is removed and criminal sanction is employed in its place. In discussing with selling clients who are decent law-abiding people as a whole this is one of the flashpoints and I have no doubt that, given time, your post-box and the ballot box will reflect that anger in the community. The energy report is a European initiative and will cover all properties from 4 January and at least is valid for ten years – I have no problem with that whatsoever even though I think the consumer lobby have over-stressed its importance to buyers who have been buying properties in Scotland for decades without worrying about energy efficiency. The property questionnaire would be a good idea if it were voluntary – I’m fairly certain that introduced as an additional tool in the armoury of house selling, many agents and their clients would have adopted it wholeheartedly, but to make someone a criminal for not completing one seems over-zealous.

6. Surveyors cannot lose. Not only do they get to carry out a full survey each time they are instructed but they can now charge an update fee every 12 weeks and the seller has to pay this. Purchasers who, or whose lender, choose to ignore the HR provided will also employ a surveyor to carry out a report. Other clients, faced with the prohibition on contacting the surveyor who carried out the single survey, when in the past a telephone conversation often provided interesting background information, will hire their own surveyor for advice – multiple surveys anyone? Already it is a shambles that only the surveyors will benefit from.

Without wishing to be melodramatic I believe the property market could possibly to go into meltdown and, whilst that cannot all be laid solely at the door of the Scottish Executive, if history shows that the rushed and heedless implementation of HRs exacerbates an already critical situation, I believe that SNP and Labour MSP s who were the architects of this misguided initiative will suffer dearly at the ballot box.

What is needed now, and this is what I am requesting you as my MSP to do, is to raise concerns in the Parliament and seek firstly to suspend HR s for at least a year and meantime to bring about changes to the compulsory nature of the Single Survey and Property Questionnaire – after all if the product becomes popular in its own right by voluntary means it will become the norm as did subject to survey offers in the past three years. Surely the sign of good government is to introduce initiatives which by common consent become part of our lives instead of legislating against the people of Scotland and making a few criminals along the way?

Despite any party allegiance I would hope that you are of sufficient independence of mind to speak up for your constituents at a time of severe crisis. Please be a part of the solution, not of the silent majority who are fiddling whilst a major part of the Scottish economy burns.

Thank you for your time and best wishes for the Festive Season.

Yours faithfully

Ivor Klayman