One of the difficulties that estate agents encounter is that regulation has, in the recent past, been tacked on to other legislation often with overlapping effect.
National Association of Estate Agents Code of Practice
The NAEA Code of Practice and Rules of Conduct can be accessed at the NAEA website –
www.naea.co.uk . All estate agents should ensure their business complies. These rules were strengthened last year by the publication of model terms of business. These were recently revised and a licence to use them can be purchased from the NAEA.
Ombudsman for Estate Agents Code of Practice
All members of the NAEA are required to belong to the Ombudsman scheme which has also obtained approval as a complaints and redress scheme under the Housing Act 2004 in connection with Home Information Packs.
The Ombudsman website is at
www.oea.co.uk. The Code of Practice can be downloaded from this site as can an outline of the complaints procedure and the Ombudsman’s terms of reference.
Consumers Estate Agents and Redress Act 2007
The Act received the Royal Assent on 19th July 2007. Parts 2, 3 and 4 affect estate agents covering redress schemes, amendments to the Estate Agents Act 1979 and ‘contracts concluded away from business premises’ respectively.
These will come into force when commencement orders are made.
We will post guidance to the relevant sections for estate agents shortly.
Our compliance fact sheets aim to bring together regulation for estate agents in an easy to understand format. The first two are in place and we aim to add to these over the coming weeks and to update them when any new legislation or case law comes along.
