Why we need the Regulation of Property Agents in England and Wales: Now
Nov 18, 2025Property sales, lettings and block management are now governed by a huge number of new and emerging consumer and housing reforms — from digital consumer protections to leasehold/freehold changes, renter protections, a renewed push toward commonhold, and a post-Grenfell building-safety regime.
In this environment, consumers can’t reliably get a safe, fair service while unqualified or rogue operators are free to undercut good agents.
A statutory regulator for property agents — with licensing, qualifications, a statutory code of practice and meaningful enforcement — is the missing piece that turns good law into good outcomes.
Why regulation is urgent now
The rules agents must navigate have multiplied and hardened. Without consistent qualifications and entry standards, ongoing training and a single point of accountability, even conscientious firms will struggle to deliver compliance at scale — and consumers are paying the price, making errors they are responsible for or have to live with that good quality agents could have prevented.
The government-commissioned Regulation of Property Agents (RoPA) report makes the case plainly: a new, independent regulator overseeing a licensing regime, mandatory qualifications and a statutory code would “significantly improve consumers’ experience of renting, letting, leasehold, and the home buying and selling process.”
Crucially, the regulator should work with Trading Standards, approved redress schemes, the courts and other statutory bodies (including the emerging building safety regime), ensuring responsibilities are clear and duplication is avoided.
What effective agent regulation looks like
1) Licensing of firms and named professionals
Licensing ties the right to practise to meeting core obligations (code compliance, qualifications, redress membership, client-money protection, AML where applicable) and gives the regulator powers to grant, supervise and rescind licences. Fit-and-proper tests stop bad actors and reduce “phoenixism.”
2) Mandatory qualifications + CPD
A regulator-set modular syllabus (delivered by Ofqual-recognised providers) ensures people doing reserved activities have the right knowledge — technical, legal and ethical — and keep it current through continuing professional development. Phased implementation avoids market bottlenecks while still ending the “experience-only” loophole.
3) A statutory code of practice
A single overarching code with activity-based modules (sales, lettings, block management, etc.) brings clarity and consistency, learning from the best of Scotland and Wales.
4) Intelligence-led assurance and enforcement
The regulator sits at the centre, receiving data from Trading Standards, redress schemes and others to spot repeat offenders and systemic risks; penalties then scale with conduct. This fixes today’s patchy enforcement where many councils rarely prosecute agents.
How consumers benefit
At present, anyone can set up as an property agent without formal qualifications.
Meanwhile, governments continue to add housing laws—yet expect them to be applied by agents who aren’t required to understand the very rules designed to protect consumers.
The Government’s Home Buying and Selling Reform consultation is finally exploring this gap. Without agent regulation, delivering meaningful, consistent change across the market will be extremely difficult.
The benefits below show why proper regulation is essential—and why anyone who wants to improve home buying and selling should respond to the consultation:
Safer, legally compliant transactions
Licensing + qualifications + a statutory code raise baseline competence across sales, lettings and management.
Consumers get agents who actually understand and can implement as well advise on the implications of the growing body of consumer and housing law.
Clearer redress and a single front door
The regulator informs consumers where to take complaints and can receive reports from whistle-blowers and other professionals - widening the net on misconduct.
Consistent, proportionate enforcement
With a national view of each firm’s track record, first-time minor breaches can be corrected through training while serial offenders face escalating sanctions - ending the cycle where bad actors simply rebrand and re-open.
Protection of client money
Mandatory client-money safeguards and professional indemnity become table stakes at licensing, protecting landlords, leaseholders and tenants from financial loss.
Transparency on leasehold/freehold charges
A regulated framework can mandate standardised service-charge information, require disclosure of commissions and agent fees, and equip residents to compare providers - tackling a major source of consumer detriment today.
This is already required under the recent DMCCA changes, but many agents simply don’t implement it and without raising standards via qualifications and stronger enforcement through regulation, this is likely to continue.
Power to fix underperformance
Stronger routes for residents to veto or switch a poor managing agent - and the ability for the regulator to block a landlord’s chosen agent where residents have reasonably exercised a veto - give communities real leverage.
Making other reforms work in practice
Building Safety
The report anticipates close coordination with “any new building safety regime.” Given the duties now placed on duty-holders and managing agents, regulation ensures the people implementing safety obligations are competent and accountable.
Leasehold & Freehold Reform / Reinvigorating Commonhold
Agent regulation underpins better service-charge governance (including standard cost codes and potential accreditation of sinking funds/asset plans) and eases transitions to Right to Manage or commonhold by helping residents select competent agents and ensuring protection if things go wrong.
Renter protections and wider consumer law
As consumer protections expand, only a licensed, qualified workforce with enforceable standards can consistently operationalise new rights for tenants and buyers across thousands of day-to-day decisions. The RoPA framework explicitly binds both companies and certain individuals acting as intermediaries to transactions, closing loopholes across traditional and newer models (online-only, rent-to-rent, guardian providers, auctioneers).
Why good agents can’t carry this alone
Most Trading Standards teams have limited resources, leading to widely inconsistent enforcement - with over half of surveyed authorities reporting no prosecutions of letting agents over a four-year period. That leaves conscientious firms competing with unqualified operators willing to cut corners. A regulator with delegated funding, clear roles and a national view fixes the gap and levels the playing field so good practice is also viable practice.
Won’t regulation increase costs for agents and sellers?
Some argue regulation won’t work for two reasons. First, that it won’t automatically make agents better. That’s true—it’s not a 100% guarantee.
However, the current system fails consumers and good agents. Compliant firms lose instructions to competitors who don’t follow all the rules—not necessarily “rogues”, but agents with no requirement to understand housing law. If they don’t know the law, they can’t apply it and the current system allows them to get away with it due to a lack of resources to enforce the law.
The second concern is that regulation would hit smaller agents hardest financially. In most sectors that may be the case, but property is different: 80% of transactions are handled by small to medium agents, conveyancers and surveyors—corporates do not dominate as they do elsewhere.
How costs could fall across different types of agents
- Corporate agencies
Likely to face higher proportional compliance costs: multiple compliance officers, training teams and organisation-wide process changes. - Small to medium, already-compliant agents
Owners/directors typically oversee compliance and manage smaller teams. Regulation adds cost, but at a lower level than corporates due to leaner structures. - Small to medium, unqualified agents
Must invest to upskill and qualify—or exit the market. Allowing unqualified practice depresses standards, harms consumers and chains, and undermines the Government’s aims.
If unqualified SMEs account for around 30% of agents, compliant firms are likely to pick up enough extra business to offset the cost of regulation as the market consolidates. Add to this that without regulation, new laws risk poor implementation and ongoing public enforcement costs, losing some smaller, poorly performing agents can only have a positive impact on consumers and the public purse.
The bottom line
Legislation has raised the bar on what agents must do; regulation ensures the right people are doing it — and that consumers can trust the result.
In addition, regulation means that agents pay to enforce themselves – rather than it just coming out of the public purse, so it’s a win win for consumers and tax payers.
By introducing licensing, qualifications, a statutory code, and intelligence-led enforcement (in partnership with Trading Standards and redress schemes), government can turn today’s patchwork into a coherent system that protects consumers, rewards professionalism, and drives out rogue practice.
Have Your Say
Take part in the government consultation before 29 December 2025:
Respond now on GOV.UK
Learn More
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