The Bank of England last week announced the completion of Project Meridian, a digital synchronised settlement prototype that aims to digitise and speed-up property transactions.
It comes after a collaboration between the Bank of England, HM Land Registry, Bank of International Settlements and property blockchain network Coadjute.
Rather than risking delays from buyers, conveyancers and lenders pushing individual payments between accounts on completion, the prototype replaces the numerous manual steps and avoids the exchanging of paper-based documents entirely, cutting the risk of fraud or transactions being delayed at the eleventh hour.
The settlement prototype works by digitising the workflow between the commercial Banks, the Bank of England and HM Land Registry.
Conveyancers connect to the service and send instructions which reserve funds.
Then, at a pre-set date and time, the funds for that property transaction, or even for a whole chain of transactions, are moved in synchronisation.
The funds are moved immediately, digital deeds are issued, and instructions sent to HM Land Registry to update the register.
The prototype paves the way for the process to be made significantly more transparent and efficient, and reduces the risk of fraud.
It will take time for buyers and sellers to benefit from this though as The Bank of England said it will use the insights from the project to inform their work beyond 2024.
John Reynolds, project director and chief operating officer at Coadjute, said: “Settlement is particularly complex and can only be tackled through deep collaboration and partnership with the public sector.
“What the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) Innovation Hub London Centre has done fantastically well here is create an open, innovative and collaborative environment for the public and private sector to work together to do just that.”
Dan Salmons, chief executive at Coadjute, added: “I've spent most of my working life leading payments innovations in Banks and FinTechs - I was there in the early days of contactless cards and mobile payments - so know first-hand what it looks like at the start of a genuine change to the way we all move money.
“Few payments are more important than those for property, and the work the Bank of England, HM Land Registry, Bank of International Settlements and Coadjute have done to reimagine the settlement process is extraordinary. We look forward to seeing the impact this project will have on shaping the future of property transactions.”
Read the full report: https://www.bis.org/publ/othp63.htm
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I have to declare a bias as Coadjute are one of Proptech-PR's key clients, but if anyone wants to see what 'very good' looks like regarding solutions that empower the realestate sector then Coadjute is wearing that crown. Not only do they enhance the conveyaning, brokerage and agency relationships by doing something 'new' and demonstrably effective, rather than building a digital twin of already existing analogue businesses that are based on the sands of the last century, they had the vision and were bold enough to grasp the future.
It took me several months to fully understand the importance and relevance of what Dan and John and the Coadjute team are really providing for the industry, and it is my day job, but having met over 900 founders and proptechs globally, I stake my reputation that Coadjute are definitely the one to align with and support, the tech may go over your head, but what it will do to enhance your business - giving all stakeholders that clarity of oversight, is the missing piece to the whole ecosystem of real-estate.
Isn’t part of the problem here that if it takes a proptech expert 2 months to get his head around it, it demonstrates that there isn’t a simple “elevator pitch” that everyone can genuinely understand. I am sure that Coadjute and its advisors understand this; solve that riddle and the critical mass will evolve, which after all is what it needs.
It works the other way Stephen, as in very few people could explain to me how a mobile works, but billions of use it on the 'what does it do for me basis' rather than I need to know how it works before I use it. Another example would be Amazon, ease of use to get a known repeatable outcome. With regard to getting my head around it I was referring to the operating system - the technical side, the moving parts that would not be a consideration for a typical person using the service.
In simple terms Coadjute speeds the plough without the stakeholder changing any of their operations or procedures, so a true enabler rather than a disruptor - that is the genuis. Adoption of a solution comes from its value add, and the minimum effort from new users.
I spoke to Dan Salmons a while ago and can confirm his proposition is in a different league to others, a true visionary, this announcement is a massive achievement and an important milestone in bringing much needed change. It’s not that hard to understand when he explains it either, even for an estate agent
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