HM Treasury Given Powers To Freeze Assets Of Cyber Criminals And Supporters
Any individual or business suspected of having ties to cyber crime can legally have their assets in the UK frozen from today. The UK Cyber Attacks (Asset-Freezing) Regulation 2019 came into force this morning, Tuesday June 11th, as the UK implement the EU’s Cyber-Attacks Regulation. Essentially, the EU Council Regulation 2019/796 allows HM Treasury to […]
Remortgaging Falls In April But First Time Buyer Mortgages Increase
First-time buyer (FTB) mortgages increase in April after a blip in March but remortgaging took a dive as recent mortgage trends suggest the property market remains confused in April. According to UK Finance Mortgage Trends data for April, 27,370 first-time buyer mortgages were completed in April which represents a 7.9% increase from the data a […]
UK Private Rental Sector To Outnumber Owner Occupiers By 2039
The private rental market could become the most dominant section of the property market within the next twenty years if market forces do not change. A generation of consistently rising house prices when coupled with poorly moving wage growth has created an affordability barrier that many feel they will never be able to break. According […]
SRA Reduce All Compensation Fund Contributions For 2019/20
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) are reducing all compensation fund contributions for 2019/20. Individual contributions will now decrease from £90 to £60. Law firms will also save £530 as their contributions fall from £1,680 to £1,150. In total, the compensation fund paid out £18.1 million in 2017/18 to the 1,553 claims that were deemed worthy […]
Broker Conveyancing Announce New Appointment
As part of their recruitment drive, Broker Conveyancing have added an account manager to their expanding team. Phil Roberts has been named as the conveyancing distributor’s area director for the Midlands region, charged with developing new and advisor relationships. Phil has a lot of experience in the sector and joins Broker Conveyancing from Stonebridge Group. He […]
SRA Report Four Email Scam Alerts In One Day
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) have issued four separate email scam alerts impersonating law firms on the same day. All four scams were reported on 6th June where emails had been falsely claiming to be from a law firm or an individual working for the business. Three out of four fraudulent attempts targeted professional employees […]
Does The Leasehold Pledge Adequately Protect Leaseholders?
In March, 40 house builders and developers signed up to a voluntary 14-point pledge designed to end the practice of unfair and onerous leaseholds, with many house builders committing themselves to the pledge, including the Home Building Federation. In the last ten years, numerous leaseholders have expressed their feelings of anger and desperation due to […]
Changes To CLR11 Land Contamination Guidance Published
The Environment Agency (EA) has published an update to the Model procedures for the management of land contamination (CLR11). The updated online guidance is built on the principles of CLR11 and the scope, purpose and the framework remains the same. The original guidance began as a research document back in 2004 and was quickly adopted […]
Industry Experts To Reveal The Future Of Conveyancing
Geodesys – part of Anglian Water and a leading provider of conveyancing searches for residential and commercial properties throughout England and Wales – has teamed up with a series of industry experts for its new Continuing Professional Development (CPD) seminar. The event will explore what the conveyancing industry will look like in 2025 and how […]
New Build Housing Failing To Keep Up With Population Increases
The extent of the housing crisis was highlighted this week as the current housing stock and newly built properties in and around the UK’s largest cities are failing to keep up with the huge growth in population. According to property lender Blend, who compared building data between 2011 and 2017 against the Office for National […]
Only 25% Of Law Firms Are Price And Service Transparent
We are six months into the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) regulated changes to the way law firms share their price and service, yet only a quarter of regulated firms are fully compliant with the standards. Worse still, One-in-five regulated law firms have failed to make any effort to comply with price and service regulations. The […]
A Focus On Regulatory Change And What It Means For The Legal Sector
The legal sector has faced a barrage of regulatory change in 2018 and 2019 with the added storm clouds of Brexit only increasing the pressures felt by the legal profession. Since the new price and service regulations came into effect on December 06, 2018, the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) have published their new updated standards […]
LEAP Legal Software Announces Major New Expansion Initiative Into The United States
LEAP Legal Software, the UK’s leading provider of cloud legal software and automated forms and precedents to small and medium sized law firms, has announced a major new expansion initiative into the United States. LEAP has more than 2,000 firms and 12,000 users using its software in the UK and Republic of Ireland. PCLaw | […]
SearchFlow Responds To Calls For Greater Reporting Of Suspicious Activities, As Part Of Crackdown On Money Laundering
SearchFlow – the UK’s leading provider of search solutions and legal reports – is urging property lawyers to make Anti-Money Laundering searches an automatic step of the due diligence process, in a bid to help combat related risks in the property transaction process. Following an article in this weekend’s Daily Mail, which reported how the […]
Application Requisitions Rise In Opening Quarter Of 2019
The number of applications being returned to conveyancers by HM Land Registry (HMLR) is increasing with 14.75% of all applications made by the 500 companies sending the most applications to HMLR resulted in a request for information from the governmental department. Between April and December last year only 13.3% of applications resulted in a requisition […]
UK Construction Experiences Sharpest Decline Since March 2018
The UK construction sector experienced its sharpest decline in construction output since the storms of March 2018. According to the seasonally adjusted IHS Markit/CIPS UK Construction Total Activity Index for May, the index rating had slipped below 50 (no change point) for the third time in four months. Despite economists predicting that construction output would […]
NHS And Public Land Sales Shortchanging The UK’s Majority
Surplus NHS and public Government owned land is being sold in record numbers, yet the benefit to most middle and low income earners will be zero. According to the ‘Still No Homes For Nurses: How NHS Land Is Being Sold Off To Build Unaffordable Homes’ report, carried out by the New Economic Foundation (NEF), found […]
New Landlord Coalition Group Offers Alternative To Section 21 Abolition
A number of national associations representing the interests of UK Landlords have united in opposition of the proposed abolition of Section 21 repossessions by creating a ‘Fair Possessions Coalition’ and offering a viable alternative. The primary objective of the coalition is to overturn the decision to abolish Section 21 repossessions or delay the abolition until […]
Landmark Information Announces Withdrawal From CoPSO
Landmark Information, the property, land and environmental data specialist, has announced its decision to withdraw its executive membership from the Council of Property Search Companies (CoPSO). As a market leading environmental report provider, Landmark will adopt a more prominent position in helping the industry, its businesses and their customers to better understand what should be […]
Government Pledge £2 Million Towards Lawtech Investment Initiatives
The Government has promised £2 million worth of investment to the legal sector in a bid to improve new and emerging technologies and solidify the UK’s legal sector as a market leader. In 2018, the Lord Chancellor and Justice Secretary, David Gauke, set up an expert panel of industry experts, governmental figures, leading members of […]
