A digital home logbook is a common repository of all the vital information and history about a home. It is a lifelong digital record of a house that is passed on between owners and creates a golden thread of information as it records events and changes over a home’s lifecycle, such as change of ownership, tenure or use, maintenance, refurbishment and other interventions. It acts in the same way as a full-service logbook records history and helps maintain and increase value and saleability of your car.
It's a dynamic tool allowing a variety of data, information and documents to be recorded, accessed, enriched and organised all in one place. In more detail, a houses logbook information can contain title information, physical information on how the property was built and managed, materials traceability, performance data and storage of warranties, certificates and guarantees.
For a homeowner, digital logbooks can also act as a platform to support so much more through the home ownership lifecycle, whether it’s navigating the new digital planning systems, finding the make, model and warranty for a boiler or when it was last serviced, scheduling in maintenance reminders to reduce lifetime costs and managing and switching utilities and other online accounts. It can be a one stop shop for all a home’s property information for everyone interacting with the home, from connecting directly to a local council to find the next bin collection to simple things like recording where the stopcock is.
The digitising and data enriching of housing facilitates transparency, trust, and more informed decision making amongst a broad range of market players, including property owners, tenants, investors, trades people, financial institutions and insurance underwriters. Data availability also helps alleviate marketplace deficiencies including the speeding up of sales transactions and market democratisation from data creating new innovative services and business models that create new kinds of value.
With the Land Registry looking at ‘tokenisation of property ownership via blockchain and many data providers rapidly moving to ‘structured web data’ and APIs, digital house log-books are starting to be discussed as property passports acting as a V5 or as a car logbook does.
The case for residential properties having a property logbook has long been argued for by a variety of organisations such as the Council for Licensed Conveyancers, Conveyancing Association, Home Buying & Selling Group and the NAEA Proper mark. It is also one of the recommendations of Dame J Hackett’s report where she believes in ‘creating a golden thread of information’ about a property throughout its life cycle.’ The UK Government has argued that it makes sense to have information that accumulates as the property ownership changes and has found the idea of a digital logbook to be the answer.
Currently one in six housing transactions fail to complete, costing the seller on average £1,945. A Law Society survey of conveyancing solicitors found 76% stated that the lack of documents caused material delays and 90% stated the lack of documents adds material costs to the conveyancing process. Property logbooks enable owners to be “Sale” and “Legally” ready - speeding up the process and reducing “Failed” transactions & associated costs. It provides comprehensive provenance and inspires greater buyer confidence with the idea of it levied by the ministry of housing at the end 2020 to stem the flow of failed transactions that are costing the UK housing market £270 million every year.
The Government has stated a preference for private companies to do the heavy lifting as it means property logbooks can be outsourced to third parties, something the current government has at its ideological heart; smaller government. However, Government through the Ministry for Housing Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) is active in helping with shape their purpose, their core content and their regulatory status.The UK Law Commission is also in consultation on property law reforms required to ensure digital assets are given consistent recognition and protection. The Call for Evidence could be the first of several steps which enshrine into UK Law the requirement to hold an official digital property record for every home and it being listed on a Fixture & Fittings form during sale.
The race to digitise housing is global and several EU countries have developed and implemented digital property logbook initiatives, including, for example, the Woningpas in Flanders (BE), the private initiative BASTA in Sweden and the PTNB in France.
The popularity of a housing logbook derives from the fact that is serves several purposes and benefits everyone involved with a home; from homeowners, renters, and property managers to insurers, conveyancers and trades people. As the world continues to digitise and property slowly but surely does as well, a digital property logbook is welcomed by everyone.
