Home Information Packs

Various rumours have surrounded Home Information Packs (HIP) since they were first announced nearly 10 years ago. HIPs came into force in England and Wales on August 1, 2007.

Here at Saffron we have compiled a few of our frequently asked questions to help guide you through Home Information Packs and what they mean to you and your home.

If you are buying or selling a home in England and Wales, you will need to know about HIPs.

What do HIPs contain?
An Energy Performance Certificate (EPC)
Other compulsory documents such as a sale statement, local searches, evidence of title, guarantees for any work on the property
Option documents such as a Home Condition Report (HCR)

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Selling a home?

If you want to sell your home you will need a HIP. Find out in this section exactly what you need to do as someone intending to sell their home.

Do I need a pack?
What do I need to do?
Where do I get a Pack?
How long does a Pack last for?
What about new build properties?
How do I compile my own Pack?
How much will it cost me?

Buying a home?

Your prospective home will need to have a HIP, the seller will not be able to sell their home without one

In this section, you can find out exactly what you need to do as a buyer.

What do I need to do?
How do I get a Pack?
Questions I need to ask
How much will it cost me?

If you still have questions about the contents of a Pack, then see our Frequently asked questions section.

Do I need a Pack?

If you want to sell your home you will need a HIP.

There are a few exceptions when you do not need a HIP. These are listed below:
Properties where there is no marketing (e.g. sale to member of your family)
Non-residential properties
Seasonal and holiday accommodation
Mixed sales (e.g. shop with flat)
Right to buy and similar sales
Sales of portfolios of properties
Properties not being sold with completely vacant possession
Unsafe properties and properties to be demolished.

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What do I need to do?

The person who is responsible for putting the property on the market and advertising the property as "For Sale" must have a Home Information Pack in their possession while the property is available for sale and is on the market.

They must provide a potential buyer with a copy of the Pack, or any document from it, on request and within the 'permitted period'.

However, if you advertise your property for sale through an estate agent (which most people do), all of these duties do not apply to you as they become the responsibility of the estate agent who is selling your property.

The 'permitted period' is either 14 days following the request for copies, or, if later, the day on which a payment for copies is received.

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Where do I get a pack?

As a seller you have a number of options of where you get a pack from.

Use an estate agent. If you use an estate agent to sell your home, they can provide a HIP for you
Get a solicitor to do it. A solicitor will be able to provide a HIP for you.
Use a specialist HIP pack provider.
Some major supermarkets have suggested they may start providing Packs.
Compile it yourself. If you have the time you can compile the Packs yourself.

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How long does a pack last for?

While the property is on the market, there is no need to update the Home Information Pack (ultimately, the market decides whether the documents remain acceptable and up to date).

If the sale of your property stops and then starts again, you would normally be required to assemble a new Pack and to update those documents which are now out of date according to the requirements of the Home Information Packs. However, the seller can carry on using the same Pack without the need to update any of the documents in the following circumstances:

Where marketing stopped because the seller accepted an offer and wants to restart marketing because the sale has fallen through, provided that remarketing starts within one year of the date when marketing first began or, if later, within 28 days of the sale falling through.
Where marketing has stopped for any other reason, the seller may remarket the property with the same Pack provided that remarketing starts within one year of the date when marketing first began or, if later, 28 days of the date on which marketing stopped.

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What about new build properties?

Sellers of newly built homes will have to provide a Home Information Pack for potential buyers. As most new homes are sold 'off plan' before they're built, there might be differences between this Pack and one provided for an older property.

For example, the searches for the property and title information may cover a wider area because the original land was bought as a plot. Also, the seller may have to provide a predicted assessment of the energy efficiency of the property, but a full Energy Performance Certificate should be provided to the buyer when the home is completed.

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How do I compile my own pack?

If you're marketing a property yourself you must have a Home Information Pack and make copies of it available to potential buyers.

Whether or not you use an estate agent you can still put together a pack yourself. You will need to contact a solicitor or conveyancer to arrange for the searches and legal documents or you could go to the appropriate local authority or to a personal search company for the searches, and to the Land Registry for evidence of title. You will still need to contact a domestic energy assessor to do the EPC and a home inspector if you want to include a home condition report.

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How much will it cost me?

The cost of HIPs is likely to vary between different providers. Experts expect the cost to be between £400 and £700. This may drop in the long term as the number of provider's increases and the market becomes more competitive.

If you get a HIP from the estate agent selling your home you will either be charged straight away or the cost will be added to the agency commission. In some cases, if the sale does not go through to completion, you may not have to pay the cost of the HIP.

The only new cost to sellers is for an Energy Performance Certificate, which is estimated to be around £100 and this tells you all about the property's energy efficiency and may give you an idea of how much the bills are likely to be.

All buyers get the information for free - so the Pack will be of particular benefit to first-time buyers.

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For buyers

What do I need to do?

The Pack has to be available when the property is marketed - so make sure you ask for it. When you get it, read it carefully, or ask your solicitor to look at it for you: it will tell you about the property's energy efficiency, any issues that have come up in the local searches, and (if it includes an optional Home Condition Report) anything you need to know about its condition.

When you have an offer accepted, make sure you give a copy of the Pack to your solicitor - this should save you time and money in the rest of the process.

Your Pack must contain:
An Energy Performance Certificate
An Index of contents
A sale statement (summarising terms of sale)
Evidence of title
Searches
Leasehold or commonhold documents where appropriate. However, where there are delays in obtaining them, some Packs may not include some of the following documents when marketing starts (although they should be added as soon as they become available):
Evidence of title (where the property is not registered, i.e. New Build properties)
Searches
Leasehold and commonhold information.

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How do I get a Pack?

Interested in buying a property? Just ask whoever is advertising it for sale for the Home Information Pack. This is usually an estate agent, but could be another business or individual.

If it's an estate agent, they must give you a copy of the Pack free of charge (although they may make a reasonable charge to cover the costs of copying and posting it). If the seller isn't using an estate agent, you should be able to get the Pack directly from them.

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Questions I need to ask

As a buyer the pack should contain all the information you require, but there are still some key issues you need to find out about. Below are some of these issues:

What does the Energy Performance Certificate say?
Check the energy efficiency rating given by the Energy Performance Certificate. It will have useful advice on any improvements that can cut fuel bills and boost the energy efficiency of the property.
Is there a Home Condition Report in the Pack?
If your seller has commissioned one, a Home Condition Report will contain useful information on the property's condition. These are currently voluntary, so there might not be one in your Pack.
Is there a legal summary?
Some Packs come with a legal summary, providing the most important information from its legal contents.
Are the searches and, in the case of leasehold/commonhold properties, the necessary documents included?
These items are not always easy to obtain quickly: at the moment, sellers have up to 28 days to get them into the Pack.

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How much will it cost me?

If you're a buyer, nothing: you'll get a copy of the Home Information Pack free. However, a reasonable charge may be made for copying and posting the pack.

With Home Information Packs, the overall costs of buying and selling a home will be similar to now, but will be spread more evenly between buyers and sellers.

The new Energy Performance Certificate is a compulsory part of the Pack, and is paid for by the seller.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Where did the idea for HIPs come from?
In 1998 the government came up with the idea of sellers' packs to speed up the house buying process by providing potential buyers with all the information they needed for a property: local searches, evidence of title from the Land Registry, a Home Condition Report (HCR) and an energy certificate. The packs would be put together and paid for by the seller.
What do the packs contain now?
Nearly 10 years later and following several alterations, the packs now contain less mandatory information.In their current form they will contain: an index of contents, an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC), a sale statement, standard searches by local authorities, evidence of title and information on leasehold or commonhold sales.However in acknowledgement that some searches may take a while to be carried out, homeowners need only include evidence that they have requested a property search from their local authority. This leaves HIPs looking decidedly slim.
Why the change?
There have been various arguments about the packs, mostly centred around the extra cost they would involve for sellers, and this seems to be one of the main reasons that HCRs went from being an integral part of the packs to a voluntary addition. Original estimates put the cost of HIPs, including an HRC, at £700 to £800. The watered-down HIPs are likely to cost between £300 and £400.
Why are experts concerned?
Several big bodies, including the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the National Association of Estate Agents and the Council of Mortgage Lenders, have all voiced their worries that HIPs will have a damaging impact on the housing market. They believe the packs do not contain enough information to make a difference to the problem of sales falling through, but are an administrative inconvenience that could damp sales. In particular, "speculative" sellers may think twice about putting their property on the market.
If I decide to sell my home what do I need to do?
You will need to get a HIP before you put your house onto the market. Failure to do so can result in a £200 fine. Packs can be obtained via an estate agent, solicitor, specialist pack provider.
What is an energy performance certificate?
This is an assessment of the energy efficiency of your home, focusing on factors such as loft insulation, the age of the boiler or whether you have double glazing. Each house will be graded between A and G, with most homes in England and Wales expected to get either a D or an E.
The report will contain advice on how to minimise energy wastage, showing how much money could be saved in bills each year and what grade the property could attain if all the changes were made. The government says the reports will raise energy consciousness and encourage buyers to consider environmental factors when looking for a house.

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