Archive

Estate agents working with international individuals can face a significant risk of encountering money laundering activities. The complex nature of cross-border...

A cross-industry collaboration aims to showcase how working horizontally across key stages of the home-buying and selling journey can positively impact...

An anti-money laundering (AML) expert has highlighted an overlooked part of this week’s King’s Speech that could boost the property market. While...

Sprift is to continue as one of the principal sponsors for the 2024 ESTAS Awards. The data firm will present the prestigious...

More than one in seven (13%) buyers purchasing properties in the UK are using funds from overseas to fund all or...

Artificial Intelligence will not be taking over people’s jobs any time soon, as machine learning is trainable only with human input.  The...

Estate agents and lettings agents have a legal obligation to protect themselves from money laundering and as such you must recognise...

There’s been a significant rise in the number of so-called Suspicious Activity Reports concerning money laundering and the agency industry. Suspicious Activity...

Regulated firms across all sectors will be well aware of Know Your Customer (KYC) checks and their importance in combatting financial...

Fraud poses a significant challenge for residential conveyancers, with criminals often attempting to exploit the transaction process for money laundering purposes. The...

Regulated firms, particularly estate agents, who take on new business clients are leaving themselves exposed to serious red flags by not...

OneDome is offering free digital know-your-customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) checks for estate agents using its various home buying services.  The...

Just one estate agency has signed up to become a UK-regulated agent to verify overseas entities for property ownership. The Register of...

The ESTAS Group has scheduled a Big Postcode Reveal event in April to detail winners of its latest award category. The Best...

Client compliance platform Thirdfort has launched its updated Secure share product to help estate agents boost referrals through the secure sharing...

The emergence of the Digital property market represents the most profound shift for the industry itself since the advent of the...

The Conveyancing Association (CA) - the leading trade body for the conveyancing industry – has announced an update to its Estate...

The conveyancing process has been highlighted as a key pain point among buyers in the property transaction process. Research by anti-money laundering...

The Home Buying and Selling Group (HBSG) is seeking feedback from agents on proposals that it feels will “revolutionise moving home...

Leading digital compliance firm SmartSearch has launched an innovative new solution to help professionals working within the UK property sector to...

As an Estate Agent it’s important to be able to interpret and understand the information that a Title Deed document presents...

OnTheMarket Software has announced an integration with digital ID and source of funds provider Thirdfort. The digital ID, anti-money laundering and source...

Client onboarding and verification tool LandmarkAgent has announce a strategic partnership with CRM provider Street.co.uk. The collaboration will enable agency users to...

Tackling economic crime is part of the day job for estate agents. But how can the latest digital ID tools help...

Step right up and witness the extraordinary world of Estate Agents as they embrace the power of biometric checks, turning the...

Sales progression service ASAP has launched a new anti-money laundering (AML) product to help agents comply with due diligence requirements and...

Agents are being warned that they risk financial and reputational costs by continuing to rely on manual methods of identity verification. It...

The Residential Logbook Association (RLBA) has launched the first iteration of its register, which aims to speed-up transactions and stop property...

New analysis may called into question the experience of firms approved to check the Government’s flagship register of overseas entities (ROE). The...

SmartSearch, the UK’s leading provider of digital compliance, has published an agenda-setting whitepaper to highlight the anti-money laundering shortcomings and sanctions...

Two of the biggest challenges facing the property industry right now are fraud and money laundering. The scale of these activities is...

Proptech firm iamproperty has launched a new legal preparation module to its movebutler onboarding and sales progression platform. The aim is to...

HMRC has fined estate agents over £500,000 for anti-money laundering (AML) breaches in the past two months. Yet despite property managers...

Dozens of estate agents have been fined a combined total of £519,645 for failing to meet their obligations under anti-money laundering...

Conveyancing is an integral part of the house buying and selling process. But it is a slow process, with the length...

The Government’s mini budget on September 23 was anything but ‘mini’ with several major announcements one of the most significant of...

If recent headlines are anything to go by, estate agents and the wider property industry are not just feeling the heavy...

Over the last five years, the Government has introduced a range of measures to regulate the property market, particularly in the...

Is Facebook giving you a headache? If you’re in the property sector, you’re not alone! From the Cambridge Analytica Scandal to...

Private Banker Finance has been named as the latest sponsor for the ESTAS Awards. The brand, which specialises in high-end mortgages -...

Landmark Information Group has been named as the latest sponsor for the ESTAS Awards. The brand, which includes Landmark Estate Agency Services,...

Agents are ‘wrongly’ relying on hard copies of identity documents to verify people’s identities in anti-money laundering (AML) checks, new research...

Almost a quarter of buyers have claimed they were not asked to verify their identity when purchasing a property, a survey...

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) recently published a list of firms that have received penalty notices for failure to meet their...

It’s taken Russia’s invasion of Ukraine for the UK to finally take a much-needed step in the right direction to stop...

A compliance expert has warned that even though most agents will have robust anti-money laundering (AML) checks and processes in place,...

Smart conveyancers are making themselves indispensable to estate agents by doing their due diligence for them. Until now, estate agents and conveyancers...

Property firms are still failing to make basic anti-money laundering checks (AML), and some may even unwittingly be helping politically exposed...

There has been so much coverage recently over how painfully slow conveyancing is at the moment - 18-20 weeks is now...

There have been many articles about ‘digitising upfront information’, following the publication of DLUHC’s Levelling-Up white paper and National Trading Standards...

As another round of property firms is fined, named and shamed for breaching anti-money laundering rules, it feels like the road...

Anti-money laundering specialist SmartSearch has reached 1,000 clients in the property industry. It comes amid increased scrutiny of money laundering amid sanctions...

In this latest ‘Women in Property’ edition of the Natter, I check in with Collette Allen, who was recently appointed as...

Many of the property firms recently fined for anti-money laundering (AML) breaches have previously turned down help, Credas claims. It was revealed...

More than 30 agents and property firms such as auction houses and valuers were reprimanded by HMRC for anti-money laundering breaches...

Just this month, the Government Property Agency kicked off its search for a digital chief to lead its 10-year technology journey,...

A government aim to improve the home buying process by making Local Land Charge search results instantly available is well underway,...

Ben Ridgway and Jamie Cooke, co-founders of iamproperty Group brought together industry leaders in a recent roundtable to discuss the challenges...

Estate agents and other property businesses need to ensure their customer screening processes are robust and up to date following extensive...

In the last two years digital Property Logbooks for our homes have moved from concept to reality with almost a quarter...

The outcome of the Ukraine crisis is far from certain, but one thing has become abundantly clear. The long-overdue Economic Crime...

Identity verification service Credas claims the UK sits second in the list of global money laundering hotspots. The amount laundered - much...

The UK property industry has long been a target of fraudsters due to the low levels of transparency and the fact...

An hour-long webinar this week aims to inform agents how to deter property fraud by greater emphasis on compliance, due diligence...

The Covid-19 pandemic has had a huge impact on all aspects of our lives, but undoubtedly one major negative side effect...

Property fraud is on the rise and early in 2022 agents will have an opportunity to attend a webinar featuring a...

Estate agents are being urged to ensure their compliance procedures are up to scratch after fraudsters stole a man’s identity and...

The phrase ‘time is money’ is particularly pertinent for estate agents. Since the stamp duty holiday ended, the forecast drop in...

The Pandora Papers - the biggest ever leak of offshore data - has revealed that the UK’s property market is being...

An alert has gone out to sales and lettings agents to be more diligent with their checking of data, and to...

Like most industries, estate agency is changing. A general trend to a more hybrid model, accelerated by the pandemic has resulted...

The recent stamp duty holiday and the subsequent conveyancing logjam this triggered has acted as a wakeup call for the industry....

Being able to show proof of funds in a quick, transparent and simple way is more crucial than ever to keep fall-throughs...

Regulators are warning the UK’s property, finance and legal sectors to be aware of the possible impacts of the exit from...

Over the last three years there has been a quiet revolution in the tenant referencing market. Starting with the 2019 tenant...

Three property agents feature on the latest list of businesses in trouble for failing to comply with money laundering regulations. The list...

The race to complete home sales before the stamp duty holiday came to an end on June 30 has created what...

While running customer identification and verification checks is part and parcel of the onboarding process for estate agents, under UK anti...

Movebutler, the digital onboarding platform from online auction specialist iamproperty, says it has some 900 agency branches signed up. These include Martin...

OnTheMarket has signed a new deal with a PropTech partner - the second in successive weeks. This latest one is a 12...

In recent years, the property market has been taking steps to become more digital – with HM Land Registry leading the...

On 28 April 2021, Fixflo ran the first in a series of quarterly legal update webinars with David Smith, Partner at...

Brexit means that the UK’s anti-money laundering laws are no longer governed by the European Union (EU), but any estate agents...

As an estate agent, you should of course be performing robust Know Your Customer (KYC) checks as part of your Anti-Money...

The Chancellor’s recent announcement that the stamp duty holiday would be extended for another three months was undoubtedly great news for...

The firm behind iamsold, the leading operator in the controversial Modern Method of Auction arena, is entering the private treaty sales...

A PropTech company has won a grant for a project to improve ID verification in the buying and selling process, via...

Estate agencies have been named by HM Revenue & Customs for breaching anti-money laundering regulations. The list of those breaching the rules...

Ever since the initial ripples of innovation in the 1990s, PropTech has proceeded to reshape our market beyond recognition; going on...

The property market, and therefore, estate agents have been accused of being the 'weak link' in the UK’s money laundering defences. This...

A new online platform claims to be the first of its kind to speed up the private treaty sales process for...

The last few months have been tough for the property sector, and the pressure will continue as estate agents across the...

If anyone thought the days of Purplebricks bosses making millions were in the past,  think again. The chief executive and chief finance...

Businesses across all sectors have struggled to adapt to the changes brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic. One group that have bucked...

As we adjust to a life post-Covid-19, letting agents, landlords, and tenants are thinking - ways to speed up the process...

There has been much speculation about when agents will be allowed back to work, and what the new office working environment...

HM Land Registry is making it easier to verify individuals’ ID from today. In addition to conveyancers and chartered legal executives, verification...

The Federation of Independent Agents and the ESTAS review and awards platform have formed what they call “a key partnership.” The FIA...

Aside from the obvious health crisis, the current pandemic is proving difficult for the business worldwide. However, despite the increasing contact...

Three more agencies have signed up to the ESTAS customer review platform. The arrival of Newton Fallowell, Lovelle and Goodchilds - all...