Costly delays on e-conveyancing

The national rollout of electronic conveyancing in Australia has been delayed, meaning that Aussie homebuyers and investors look set to miss out on cost savings worth hundreds of millions of dollars...

E-conveyancing is the transformation of the current paper-based conveyancing system into electronic form, using electronic documents, requisitions and signatures.

The Australian Government has described it as ‘Australia's joint Government and industry initiative to create an efficient and convenient way of completing property based transactions and lodging land title dealings for registration.'

But now, the Government has taken the decision to delay the e-conveyancing - which was meant to be introduced all across the country by March next year - by almost two years.

It has now been decided that the new system will be available by Christmas 2011. This latest announcement flies in the face of the enthusiastic announcements last year by the Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Finance Minister. At the time, they predicted that the new electronic system could save buyers ‘hundreds of dollars on every home they purchase.'

When plans were first announced to introduce the system, Law Council President-Elect John Corcoran said, "The resolution is a positive and long sought-after breakthrough in the legal profession's campaign to see a seamless, national electronic conveyancing system implemented in Australia."

But, with news of the long delays, cost savings were said to be worth as much as £119 million. Therefore, this new delay could wipe out £209.8 million worth of cost savings on property transactions.

The delay has been blamed on the credit crunch, which has meant that state Governments have been unable to proceed with the new system and have stumbled over the funding of the scheme.

Urgent talks are set to take place this week between Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner, representatives of the Law Council and the Australian Bankers Association to try to get the project back on track.

Picture by Thiru Murugan