Industry ‘selling homes’ jargon too confusing for consumers – claim
Tim Main of PiP says sector needs to get together to establish the most accurate phrases to use when claiming to 'sell a property'.
A leading figure has called for estate agents to agree and then use a standard set of phrases to use when communicating with the public about selling homes.
Tim Main (pictured), who runs property information platform PiP, says too many buyers and vendors are confused by the multiple and sometimes overlapping terms used by agents to describe the sales progression process.
“There seem to be a number of definitions for when a sale has been agreed and a Memorandum of Sale prepared and circulated,” he adds.
“In some recent press articles Soldstc was shortened to SOLD, which is definitely misleading. Is it now time for a change.
Main says ‘sale agreed’ would be a clearer and better-understood sale description for homes selling.
“If we cannot clearly communicate with the buyers and sellers then a quicker and more transparent system will be even more difficult however digital it gets,” he adds.
Homes sales
“Many articles about improving the sales process talk about estate agents and conveyancers/solicitors clearly setting their clients expectations.
“But this cannot be done until there is a common language that everyone understands.”
Terminology matters in the sector – only two months ago agents were slammed by Henry Pryor for continuing to market properties ‘for sale’ on portals that were in reality ‘under offer’.
And the loose terms used by agents can also cause problems – many buyers don’t realise a property is taken off the market and marked as SSTC once their offer has been accepted.
