Material Information: What Must Be on a UK Property Listing

There is a version of a UK property listing that used to be acceptable: four photographs, a floor plan, "well-presented three bed semi in a popular location", and everything else discovered at the viewing or by the buyer's solicitor six weeks later.

That version is finished. Material information rules mean the things a buyer needs to make a decision must appear in the listing itself, and the portals now enforce large parts of it before a property will go live.

The three parts, plainly

The National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency Team split the requirements into three groups. It helps to think of them as "always", "always" and "sometimes".

Part A — the basics, on every listing. Council tax band or rate, the asking price, and the tenure. For a leasehold property that means the lease length remaining, the service charge and the ground rent. These are not optional and they are not "available on request".

Part B — also on every listing. The physical make-up of the property: property type, construction materials, number and types of room, utilities, and how the place is heated. Parking arrangements. Broadband and mobile coverage.

Part C — where it applies. The things that only affect some properties, but affect them enormously. Flood risk and flood defences. Coastal erosion. Whether the property has been underpinned. Restrictive covenants, rights of way, easements. Any planning permission granted nearby. Accessibility features. Whether it is in a conservation area or listed.

The logic is straightforward once you see it: Part A and B describe what the property is, and Part C describes what a buyer would be annoyed to discover late.

Where agents actually get caught

Not on the exotic items. On the ordinary ones.

Leasehold detail left blank. "Leasehold — details TBC" is the single most common gap. If you do not have the lease length, service charge and ground rent, you do not yet have a listing. Get them from the seller before the photographs.

Construction type guessed. Standard brick and block is the assumption, and it is wrong often enough to matter. Non-standard construction affects mortgageability, which means it affects whether your buyer completes. Ask.

Flood risk skipped because "it has never flooded". The disclosure is about risk, not history. The data is public. Check it.

Parking described vaguely. "Parking available" is not a disclosure. Allocated, permit, on-street, garage, or none — say which.

Lay it out so it is actually read

Compliance and good marketing are not in tension here, which surprises people. A buyer who can see the council tax band, tenure and heating type without scrolling is a buyer who trusts the listing.

A layout that works:

• Price and tenure together, at the top. If it is leasehold, the lease length sits beside the price rather than three screens down.
• A short facts block. Council tax band, tenure, heating, parking, broadband speed. Six lines, scannable, no prose.
• A "things to know" block for anything from Part C. Do not bury it. A buyer who finds a right of way disclosed honestly in the listing rarely walks; a buyer who finds it in a search pack usually renegotiates.
• Then the description. Once the facts are handled, the prose can do what prose is for.

The commercial argument

It is tempting to treat this as paperwork imposed from outside. The agents who have adapted fastest tend to describe it differently: it moves the awkward conversation from week six to day one.

A fall-through after a survey costs a seller a month and costs you a fee. Disclosing the underpinning up front loses you the buyers who were never going to complete, and keeps the ones who will. On a portfolio of listings that trade is strongly in your favour.

It also makes you look like the professional in the room. At a valuation, being able to say "here is everything a buyer will ask, and we publish it from day one" is a stronger pitch than a lower fee.

A checklist before you publish

1. Council tax band confirmed, not estimated.
2. Tenure stated. If leasehold: years remaining, service charge, ground rent — all three.
3. Construction type confirmed with the seller, not assumed.
4. Heating and utilities listed.
5. Parking specified precisely.
6. Broadband and mobile coverage checked.
7. Flood risk checked against the data, whatever the seller says.
8. Part C items reviewed and disclosed where they apply.
9. Your redress scheme membership shown, along with your firm's details.

If your own property pages carry the same block as your portal listings, you have one source of truth and nothing to reconcile — which is the point.