There is a wildly dangerous, and some (me) would argue - frankly insane - belief embedded within the British property industry.
A belief that has held back meaningful reform for decades.
A belief that says:
"If we can just get the Government involved, they'll fix it."
But they won't.
Not because they're unwilling.
Because they're frankly incapable.
And the sooner those supposed "industry experts" accept that reality, the sooner genuine reform can begin.
The Wrong Tool For The Job
Governments are not innovation engines.
They are simply regulatory bodies.
Their primary function is to create rules, enforce rules, and administer rules.
That's it.
The Government only has one primary lever it can pull:
More regulation.
When faced with a problem, its instinct is almost always the same:
Create a consultation.
Draft legislation.
Issue guidance.
Create oversight.
Introduce enforcement.
In other words, regulate.
But for anyone who has been in the property world for more than five minutes knows, the housing market is not suffering from a shortage of regulation.
Quite the opposite.
It's drowning in it.
Conveyancers already operate within one of the most heavily regulated professional environments in Britain.
Anti-money laundering requirements.
Consumer protection legislation.
Professional conduct obligations.
Lender requirements.
Search requirements.
Risk assessments.
Identity verification.
Disclosure obligations.
The list is endless.
Yet despite a greater push for more regulation, the fundamental problems have become progressively worse over recent years.
Transactions have become painfully slow.
One-in-three sales still fall through.
Consumers are still bearing the cost for this dysfunction.
Property professionals' businesses are still struggling.
Which raises an obvious question:
If regulation was the answer, wouldn't it have worked by now?
The Definition Of Insanity
There is a famous saying often attributed to Albert Einstein:
"The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."
Yet this appears to be the industry's preferred strategy.
Especially one pushed by trade bodies, and public figures.
Every few years the same conversation emerges.
The market is broken...
Consumers are at risk...
Transactions are too slow...
Businesses are under pressure...
And the proposed solution?
Government intervention.
Again.
As though the previous interventions never happened.
The property market is littered with examples of well-intentioned government interventions that failed to achieve their objectives.
Home Information Packs (HIPs) were supposed to transform the home-moving process.
Instead, they became a cautionary tale.
Years of planning.
Millions spent.
Political fanfare.
And ultimately abandonment.
Today we are witnessing similar challenges elsewhere in the housing sector.
Policies introduced with the intention of helping consumers often create entirely new problems.
Because housing markets are complex ecosystems.
Change one part and consequences emerge somewhere else.
Often where nobody anticipated. Because they couldn't see beyond the immediate knee-jerk response to the current issue. No lateral thinking. No understanding of possible consequences. And importantly, no understanding of business or what those at the sharp end of the process are actually dealing with.
The reality is simple:
Legislation can (potentially) compel behaviour.
BUT IT CANNOT create innovation.
Most policy advisers have never managed a property transaction from instruction to completion.
Many have only moved home a couple of times in their lives.
Yet somehow we're expect them to let them advise on how to redesign one of the most complicated consumer transactions in existence?
It is a staggering expectation. And deeply flawed.
Would you ever board a plane piloted by someone who had never flown before? The answer is obvious.
Yet the property sector routinely asks people with limited practical experience of housing transactions to redesign the housing market.
This is where the expectation fundamentally breaks down.
The Government cannot and will not teach an estate agency how to become more profitable. It is doubtful the trade bodies can either.
Government cannot teach conveyancers how to improve client experience. And it seems the regulators aren't helping here either.
The state cannot teach property professionals how to build trust with consumers. It's having a hard enough job trying to build trust in itself.
It cannot teach innovation.
It cannot teach entrepreneurship.
It cannot create leadership.
Those things can only emerge from the market itself.
From those Maverick personalities willing to challenge assumptions.
From those Maverick personalities willing to experiment.
From those Maverick personalities willing to reject the status quo and build something better.
The greatest advances in human progress have never emerged from government.
They've emerged from the entrepreneurs, innovators, visionaries, and problem-solvers who refused to accept that the status quo was the best available option.
Perhaps the biggest problem isn't government.
Perhaps it's the industry's dependence upon government.
Too many organisations have become conditioned to wait.
Waiting on (more) legislation.
Waiting for consultations.
Waiting for working groups.
Waiting for regulatory reform.
Waiting for somebody else to solve the problem.
Why? Because its safe. It requires no leadership or skill whatsoever to say someone else should fix the problem rather than attempting to fix it oneself. It's lazy, non-Maverick thinking.
Meanwhile consumers continue suffering.
Businesses continue struggling.
Transactions continue failing.
The market continues deteriorating.
And nobody is willing to take responsibility. They simply point the finger at the Government and say they're the ones responsible for fixing the problem.
This is the truly frustrating part.
Many of the solutions are already known.
Upfront information.
Greater transparency.
Better alignment of incentives.
Earlier legal intervention.
Consumer education.
Improved communication.
Technology-enabled workflows.
The challenge isn't a lack of solutions.
The challenge is a lack of leadership.
Because leadership requires action.
And action requires courage.
Something that is sadly, sadly lacking across one of Britain's most important sectors.
Why The Maverick Movement Exists
The Maverick Movement was born from a simple realisation:
Despite the regular fanfare in the news, nobody is coming to save the housing market.
Not the Government.
Not the regulators.
Not the trade bodies.
Not industry committees, think tanks or civil servants.
If meaningful reform is going to happen, it can only come from those people on the front line who truly understand the problems best.
The people living with them every day.
The people serving consumers.
The people building businesses within the dysfunction.
The people prepared to challenge decades of accepted nonsense.
Because genuine reform is not created via legislation.
It is created through leadership.
And leadership begins when somebody stops waiting for permission and starts taking action. Something that terrifies the status quo and all the people at the top who continue to get paid regardless of whether or not people move home.
Like the choice faced by Neo in the Matrix, the property industry stands at a crossroads.
One path continues the familiar cycle.
More consultations.
More reports.
More lobbying.
More waiting.
The other path is harder.
It requires personal responsibility.
It requires innovation.
It requires courage.
It requires people willing to challenge the Matrix of systems that does not serve consumers.
Only one of those paths leads to transformation.
The other leads to another decade of excuses.
The question is simple:
How much longer are we prepared to wait?