London is the slowest-moving region as new research highlights torpid home-buying process

Proposals include upfront 'sales packs', binding contracts and possible mandatory agent qualifications.

Consultations have opened into significant & wide-ranging reforms that promise to 'rewire a chaotic system which has become a barrier to homeownership.'

Ministers want to speed up homebuying and reduce failed sales, but many of the reforms being proposed have long been standard practice at the top end of the market, writes property lawyer Laura Conduit.