First published in February 2022, the National Trading Standards and the UK Government introduced new regulations for more material information being displayed upfront when advertising a property for sale. This announcement was covered in the property press with a focus on the requirement for all estate agent websites and property portals to include this extra ‘material information’ on all their UK residential property listings from 31 May 2022. This includes both sales and lettings property listings and the aim is to ensure more transparency for consumers looking to purchase or rent properties.

The roll-out of these changes is split into three phases: A, B and C.

Part A includes information that is considered material for all properties and requires the following information to be included in property listings from the 31 May 2022 for:

Sales

• Price (£)
• Tenure (freehold, leasehold, share of leasehold, commonhold, feudal)
• Length of lease (years remaining)
• Annual ground rent amount (£)
• Ground rent review period (year/month)
• Annual service charge amount (£)
• Service charge review period (year/month)
• Council tax band (England, Wales and Scotland)
• Shared Ownership (% share being sold)

Lettings

• Price - rent (£)
• Deposit (£)
• Length of tenancy (year/month)
• Council tax band (England, Wales and Scotland)

Part B covers information that must be established for all properties. It applies mainly to utilities (and similar) where non-standard features would affect someone’s decision to look any further at that property.

Part C covers additional material information that may or may not need to be established, depending on whether the property is affected or impacted by the information. Applies to properties affected by the issue itself because of, for example, the location of the property.

The exact details of Part B and C are not yet available and once they have been agreed and made public we will share this information with you. You can also find more information here.