The Home Buying & Selling Group (HBSG) has started to roll out its Property Data Trust Framework to the public and has offered its data schema and API spec to developers.
The Property Data Trust Framework (PDTF) follows the industry and government’s wider ambition for a thriving, fast-growing digital sector in the UK, underpinned by public trust. The working group provides the data, technology and trust standards which underpin a digital Buying and Selling Property Information (BASPI) and upfront information.
According to the HBSG, there have been several attempts to use technology to improve the poor consumer experience of buying and selling residential property in the UK. The reasons these have not been successful are varied, but commonly they have sought to create a new proprietary digital platform on which all transactions must be conducted. Due to the highly fragmented nature of the industry, it has not yet been possible to secure sufficient adoption to incentivise all stakeholders to participate.
In setting out the PDTF, the HBSG seeks to propose a set of data, interface and governance principles that put the consumer (buyer and seller) at the heart of the process and allow participants to share data and coordinate transactions in a platform and technology-agnostic manner. They believe this openness and transparency will provide the right conditions for broad industry adoption.
The PDTF will enable people and organisations to use and reuse information relating to a property. It will give them a way to access and share authenticated property information or “property attributes” with other people and organisations more easily.
The trust framework is a set of data standards, technical standards, and process rules that different organisations agree to follow to deliver one or more of their services. This includes legislation, standards, guidance, and the rules.
By adopting these standards, all services and organisations using the trust framework can describe property information they’ve created in a consistent way. This will make it easier for organisations and users to complete property transactions or share information with other trust framework participants.
HBSG Chair Maria Harris said:
“I’m delighted that we’re now able to share the framework and schemas with the rest of the industry.
With huge thanks to all the participating firms who’ve collaborated, volunteered, and given so much time and hard work to get the standards to a point where we can now implement them into frontline systems and make these services available on live property transactions.
She added: “The development of the Property Data Trust Framework is a significant milestone in the much-needed move of the industry from documents to data. Through digitisation of the upfront property data, connecting our systems using a common set of API standards, and redesigning the end-to-end journey, we’ve seen a real breakthrough in improving the customer and user experience.
Industry adoption will be one of our biggest challenges, so I’d encourage anyone not already involved in our group to get in touch or speak to their software provider about what this means for them.”
Further information on the Property Data Trust Framework and links to HBSG’s data schema and API framework is available here.
Additional Resources
Information about Property Data Trust Framework
Latest draft of the Property Data Trust Framework
For developers: Github link to data schema and API framework