From Legal Futures Associate Search Acumen.
In recent years, we’ve seen an abundance of property reports enter the market. The proliferation of choice has taken hold of the conveyancing industry, and lawyers are increasingly at risk of being overwhelmed by the multitude of data on offer.
But, more reports doesn’t necessarily mean more information. With significant crossover and duplication between reports, conveyancers are spending valuable time and resources checking this repetitive material to ascertain the appropriate risks associated with their property.
Laborious and lengthy, this aspect of the due diligence process is both inefficient and outdated. Existing tools to help lawyers sort through reports are unable to fully refine the wealth of information available to conveyancers and, in this new age of data more sophisticated solutions to help optimise are needed.
Cynics and critics would argue that some search tools have become a means of just selling customers more. And who could blame them? We’ve witnessed an emerging trend in recent years to find new risks as means of encouraging additional, often unnecessary purchases further adding to this overload of information.
Bucking the trend
At Search Acumen we’re looking to buck this trend, giving the conveyancer just what they need, not more.
We designed Search Basket Optimisation – a new feature of our platform – to perform ‘under the bonnet’ data analytics. When you request reports on a particular property or title, our data tools will analyse the property in question to ascertain the most pertinent risks if you choose to benefit from this latest advancement. It will then recommend the reports of highest relevance and importance, and suggest the most efficient combination of reports, minimising crossover or duplication of content.
The future of reports
The unlocking of data means the way we consume information and conduct due diligence is set to change dramatically, not just in volume but in format too. Off the shelf reports are the current norm for conveyancers, but with the unlocking of data en masse, we will soon see the norm being challenged.
Thanks to schemes such as the Open Data Initiative and Geospatial Commission, off the shelf reports could soon be replaced with tailored packages of data, unique to a property or title.
The majority of data needed to transact on a property will soon be at the fingertips of lawyers. But without the help of data specialists, users may drown in millions of datasets and the wealth of information at their fingertips could be a burden rather than a benefit.
Our mission today, with this future in mind, is to ensure conveyancers have the tools to extract usable insights which ultimately lead to better business outcomes.
