10 May 2019
Today at The National Association of Property Buyers we’re celebrating our 5th anniversary. Launched on the 14th May 2014, the NAPB, a not-for-profit organisation began in response to an OFT study in to the ‘quick sale’ sector – companies that purchase home quickly for cash, usually within a matter of just days.
The OFT study found that the sector was almost entirely unregulated which was far from ideal for sellers or the home buying companies themselves. Something needed to be done – in the words of The OFT “consumers need to know what good looks like.”
A small group of professional buyers including House Buy Fast liaised with both The OFT and latterly The Property Ombudsman Service (TPOS) and developed a brand new Code of Practice for Property Buying Companies. A copy of the most recent version can be viewed HERE.
We’re very proud of the Code which ensures sellers have the protection they need, very much along the lines of the rules that give consumers a right of redress if things go wrong with an estate or letting agent. It covers record-keeping, rights of those with a disability or at a disadvantage, fairness when offering and a prohibition of reducing a price late in the transaction without fair reason. All NAPB members must also be a member of TPOS and agree to abide by it’s Code. For those that don’t there are financial penalties.
The NAPB promotes the Code of Practice to homeowners considering selling to a professional buyer and encourages them to explore all options and only use a buyer signed up to the Code.
We are proud that after 5 years and thousands of purchases by members, amounting to billions of pounds, The TPOS has only had 8 complaints with one upheld!
We think that is quite an achievement and is testament to the hard work that members have put in to train staff to abide by high standards expected by The NAPB and TPOS.
And finally…
We asked around the office what we could do to celebrate our 5th birthday and decided that a small donation to charity would be a nice way to mark our latest milestone. As a small, not for profit organisation ourselves we don’t have much in the way of cash reserves but we’ve allocated £250 to be divided equally between five charities in the financial/housing sector. We’ll make the donations shortly and leave details in our ‘news’ section.
