Single survey 'will not remove need for valuations'

The single survey proposed by Communities Scotland to aid the house-buying process in the country will not remove the need for mortgage lenders to conduct their own surveys.

Such is the view of the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) Scotland, which has responded to a paper on the proposed reforms from Communities Scotland today.

The council states that in a number of circumstances, such as when a particular surveyor does not meet with the criteria set by a lender, the mortgage firm would still need to conduct a separate survey – a point which the CML states is ignored in the current consultation.

A separate concern raised by the body was that relationships between estate agents and surveyors should also be transparent.

Kennedy Foster, CML Scotland policy consultant, commented: "We are disappointed that our concerns have not been addressed in the Communities Scotland consultation paper.

"The introduction of the single survey is a massive change to the home buying and selling process in Scotland and we believe more work is needed to ensure the new system is a success."

Single surveys are intended to be implemented as a means of making the house buying and selling process simpler and reduce the number of transactions which fall through.

In February the Law Society of Scotland welcomed the Scottish Executive’s desire to improve the property sale process.

However, Janette Wilson of the organisation’s conveyancing committee commented that it still has "concerns about the proposed form of the single survey [which] may create new problems to replace those that it set out to solve".