Nationwide has joined the Open Property Data Association (OPDA) in a move to help digitise and speed up the home buying process.
The building society plans to champion consumer awareness and drive industry engagement of what digital property data is and why it is necessary.
Already contributing to the open data standards, Nationwide will implement and drive the adoption of the OPDA’s framework in its own solutions and with its industry and technology partners.
Trusted open data
The OPDA was founded in June last year. Its mission is for every company in the mortgage and property chain to have access to the same property information, or open data, in a digital, standardised, and trusted format.
This year, it delivered its framework for property data standards, which has made free and shareable data tools available across the property industry.
Less than 1% of all property information is currently available digitally, according to the association. It wants to see the conversion of all property data sources and documents to a digital format so that they can be shared to make the home buying process more efficient.
Reduction in turnaround times
The OPDA says the same information is sometimes requested as many as five times by different parties, such as lenders, estate agents and solicitors.
Having one version of the data, says the OPDA, will simplify the process and reduce the time between having an offer accepted on a home and the exchange. Shareable and trustable data will also reduce fraud and prevent transactions falling through.
Henry Jordan, Nationwide’s director of home, said: “At Nationwide, we are totally committed to improving the end-to-end house buying and homeownership journey. Our joining OPDA is a major part of this commitment as standardisation of data is vital for achieving improvements. We can bring our wealth of mortgage experience as well as customer engagement and insights to ensure that data is shareable to create a safer, more trusted experience for customers.”
Milestone for OPDA mission
Maria Harris, chair of the OPDA, said: “Nationwide’s membership marks another huge milestone for our mission to radically transform the home buying process for the better. Having a well-known and respected brand such as Nationwide as an OPDA member will really boost the message around [the] importance of open data standards to digitising property transactions.”
The association has called on the government to digitise the entire home buying and selling process within three years.
Harris gave evidence in May to the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Select Committee’s Improving the home buying and selling process inquiry.
It is also working with the government, through the Digital Property Market Steering Group and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC), to encourage the adoption of open data standards.
Samantha Partington is a freelance trade and consumer journalist writing about property and personal finance. Previously she worked worked for the Daily Mail and Property Week. She is the former deputy editor of Mortgage Solutions and editor of Specialist Lending Solutions.
Before becoming a journalist, Samantha worked as a mortgage broker and latterly for a mortgage, bridging and secured loan lender. Samantha is CeMAP qualified. Follow her on Twitter @SamJPartington1.
