The art and fun of valuations has taken a pounding

15 August 2011

In the years that I have been in this game I’ve seen a few changes and not all have been for the better.

These days there is a rush to exchange by Friday or complete by Monday.

Thirty years ago I used to do six valuations the day before I went on holiday and dictate them when I came back and no-one fretted.

Back then a lender was a middle-aged building society manager who wore a jacket with a patch on the elbow, smoked a pipe and drove a Wolseley car.

They were solid dependable chaps who could still open the batting if the village team was mortgage unless you’d invested with them for years and they knew you by your first name.

They accepted your word and valuation forms never asked for comparables. They also made the lending decision and didn’t have to refer to underwriters or heads of credit.

Building surveys were called structural surveys and were documents in which surveyors could make a bold comment without fear of ending up in the Royal Courts of Justice being sued for negligence.

We are too litigious now, which brings me to a subject I have misgivings about. That subject is the obsession the central London residential property market has with valuing everything on a pound per square foot basis.

Surveyors could make bold comments without fear of ending up in the Royal Courts of Justice being sued

Valuation is in danger of becoming little more than a mathematical exercise.

Has anyone ever said to you that “I want to buy in such and such a place and have £1,000 per square foot to spend and I won’t go a penny over”?

Of course not, it’s only surveyors and estate agents who talk like that and I am as guilty as anyone.

The fun has gone out of it all as you don’t even have to measure properties any more because estate agents’ details include a floor plan so it’s done for you.

Valuation should be about establishing a core value, then adding a bit for a great view or a good finish and conversely, knocking a bit off if it’s run down or the accommodation doesn’t flow.

Pound per square foot doesn’t recognise any of this or a good garden or parking space.

We are in danger of reducing the art of valuation to something a computer can do.

The profession needs to sit up and take notice because if it doesn’t, every valuation will be done according to an automated model before too long and valuation surveyors will be no more.

I’ll be retired in Spain with my good friend Rioja by then so I’m not bothered, but it will happen.

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