Plans to make greater use of digital services to speed up housebuying were unveiled by the government, while Angela Rayner said Labour had “no excuses” not to hit its 1.5 million homebuilding target.     

The government said yesterday it will bring down housebuying delays of almost five months for millions of buyers by “driving forward plans for digital identity services to slash transactions”. 

It plans to do this by, “opening up key property information to “ensure data can be shared between trusted professionals more easily”. 

“By making information available at people’s fingertips, it will be far less likely for surprises to be encountered later on in the process,” said the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.  

“This will make it easier for people to get onto the housing ladder, reduce the requirement to share ID in-person in the long-term, and decrease the number of transactions collapsing.” 

The department has launched a 12-week project “to identify the design and implementation of agreed rules on data for the sector so that it can easily be shared between conveyancers, lenders and other parties involved in a transaction”. 

It added that HM Land Registry will build on its work in digitising property information and lead 10-month pilots with a number of councils to identify the best approach to opening up more of their data and making it digital, while the government pushes ahead with plans for digital identity verification services including in the property sector.  

The department points out that collapsed home sales – which impact one in three transactions – cost people around £400m a year, on top of the four million working days lost by conveyancers and estate agents alone which amounts to £1bn.    

It added that the introduction of digital homebuying services in Norway has helped the country bring down completed transactions to around one month. 

Housing and planning minister Matthew Pennycook said: “We are streamlining the cumbersome home buying process so that it is fit for the twenty-first century, helping homebuyers save money, gain time and reduce stress while also cutting the number of house sales that fall through.” 

Conveyancing Association director of delivery Beth Rudolf welcomed the move. 

Rudolf said: “We have been heavily involved in pushing forward the digital property data agenda and what greater provision can achieve.  

“We believe this is not just about its use for home buying and selling, but it will provide far greater benefits across the lifecycle of a property, enabling parties to have the right view of the property data whenever they transact or need to act, whether that is a remortgage, altering or finding a planning application, for letting purposes, or retrofitting to meet net zero targets.” 

The announcement on Sunday came as Angela Rayner reiterated the government’s pledge to build 1.5 million homes over the next five years. 

“There are no excuses to not build those homes that people desperately need,” the Deputy Prime Minister told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.  

“We mean business on this, because far too many people are not getting these homes,” she added. 

Over the last five years, the country built around 1 million homes. 

The government has instructed local councils to submit plans to collectively build 370,000 a year. 

The last time an average of 300,000 new homes a year were built in the UK was in the late 1970s. 

However, on the same programme, Gillian Keegan, a former Conservative MP and education secretary, said the current pace of housebuilding was “too slow”.

Keegan added: “The highest number we got to was about 249,000 in one year. Now obviously we had to navigate Brexit, Covid and a war in Europe at the time. 

“But that shows you the size of the challenge.” 

Propertymark chief executive Nathan Emerson argued that the government must quickly push through its plans to build more homes if it is to keep to its target.   

Emerson said: “As the population of the UK continues to expand, it is vital we start to see targeted plans drawn up and implemented in regions where new housing is most needed. 

“It is essential that full attention is turned to implementing legislation that allows for this ambition to become a reality, and that there is wide-ranging engagement to ensure all plans bring the correct levels of infrastructure and help deliver a balanced housing mix on a regional basis. 

“Ultimately, to keep pace, there will need to be almost thirty thousand new homes constructed every month before summer 2029.”