The Open Property Data Association (OPDA) is asking homebuyers for their opinions to shape the future of home buying.
The trade association wants as many people as possible to complete its survey, particularly those who have bought or sold a property in the past five years.
What is the OPDA?
OPDA is a trade association committed to a faster and smoother property purchase process. It is in consultation with the Government to improve the home buying and selling process.
To help shape these discussions, it wants to discover what buyers think should be done to improve what is often a poor experience.
Much of the home buying process still relies on paper, duplication, multiple signatures, and manual checks. Consequently, it is taking an average of 22 weeks for customers to reach completion on their home purchase, according to Rightmove.
By contrast, those using OPDA’s data standards for digital property packs have seen time reduced from mortgage offer and purchase accepted to exchange within 15 days.
The association wants to understand how much homebuyers know about digital property information and how comfortable they would be using and sharing data, which could well transform the process for the better.
The association now has over 30 members including major lenders such as NatWest Group, HSBC, Nationwide and Lloyds Banking Group.
Maria Harris, chair of OPDA, said: “We’ve all heard examples of how bad the torturous and archaic home buying experience is in this country.
“But we’re taking our research further by asking homebuyers not only what they think about the experience, but also how they feel it could be improved and about their attitudes to digital property information. We need as many people as possible to take part in the survey so that we can really represent the consumer voice.”
You can click here to complete the survey.
It takes fewer than 15 minutes and can be completed anonymously. The deadline for responses is Monday 30 September.
