This guide is written for solicitors, trainees and law students in England and Wales.
An upfront information pack is a set of property details a seller provides when a home goes on the market. Not after an offer. The government confirmed the policy in its home buying and selling reform roadmap on 19 June 2026. It is not law yet. The first firm deadline is a code of practice for agents later this year.
Who is this guide for?
Residential conveyancers, and anyone who has to answer a client asking what the reforms mean.
That question is already arriving. The announcement got wide coverage, and clients rarely distinguish between a policy paper and a commencement date. This guide separates the two.
It is also for firms deciding whether to change how they take instructions. Some of the reform can be adopted today without waiting for legislation. There is a competitive argument for doing so.
What did the government actually announce?
A roadmap, published on 19 June 2026 by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. It followed a consultation that ran from 6 October to 29 December 2025.
The roadmap confirms the government will proceed. It does not commence anything. Delivery runs across this Parliament, and the major elements need primary legislation.
The problem being solved is well evidenced. A transaction takes an average of 120 days. Around one in three falls through. MHCLG expects the package to halve failed transactions. It also expects to cut roughly four weeks off the five months between instruction and completion, saving a first-time buyer about £710.
What goes in an upfront information pack?
More than most firms currently gather before an offer.
The proposed list covers tenure, council tax band, EPC rating and property type. It adds title information and seller identity verification. Then leasehold terms, service charges, building safety data, standard searches, planning consents, flood risk data, chain status and clear floor plans.
A property condition assessment sits in there too, scaled to the age and type of the property.
Three further strands travel alongside it. Binding conditional contracts aim to curb gazumping and gazundering, with a financial penalty for withdrawing without good reason. Digital property logbooks and standardised data sharing underpin the whole thing. Digital identity verification becomes routine.
How does this compare with the current process?
| Stage | Now | Proposed |
|---|---|---|
| Instruction | Often after an offer is accepted | Before listing, so the pack can be built |
| Title and searches | Ordered once the buyer instructs | Assembled by the seller in advance |
| Leasehold information | Requested from the managing agent, often the longest delay | Provided at listing, with fees and turnaround times to be capped |
| Enquiries | Raised after an offer, answered over weeks | Largely pre-answered by the pack |
| Point of commitment | Exchange, with either party free to walk before it | Binding conditional contract earlier, with a penalty for withdrawal |
| Identity checks | Firm by firm, often repeated | Digital verification, reusable across the chain |
| Agents | No mandatory qualification | Code of practice in 2026, qualifications consulted on in 2027 |
Does liability change?
No. This is the point clients most often get wrong.
Liability stays exactly where it sits today. A conveyancer owes the same duties on the same material. What changes is when the information arrives and how consistent it is.
The practical effect is that work moves to the front of a transaction rather than leaving it. Firms will prepare packs before a listing instead of answering enquiries after an offer. Total effort may not fall much. Its position in the timeline changes completely.
That carries a commercial consequence worth planning for. Fees currently earned late in a matter get incurred early, before a transaction is certain to proceed. A firm that does not adjust its billing structure will feel it in cash flow.
Nothing here has commenced, but the direction is settled and part of it can be adopted now. A firm that gets seller clients to instruct before listing shortens transactions today. It is also positioned for the future regime. The billing point matters just as much: work moves earlier, so payment terms need to move with it.
When does each part arrive?
Only the first stage carries a date.
Later in 2026. A code of practice for property agents, plus guidance on the quality of information in listings. The code sets minimum standards and is non-statutory at first. The government has kept the option of legislating if compliance is poor.
2027. A consultation on mandatory qualifications for estate agents, and expanded digital tools.
Later in this Parliament. Mandatory upfront information and binding conditional contracts, both of which need legislation.
Separately, the government plans to cap what managing agents can charge for information requests, and how long they may take. It will use powers in the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024.
What does this mean for leasehold?
Possibly more than any other part of the package.
Leasehold transactions stall in one predictable place. The managing agent pack. Service charge accounts, building safety information and consent details all come from a third party with no contractual duty to the buyer and little incentive to hurry.
Upfront information makes that worse before it makes it better. Service charges, leasehold terms and building safety data all sit on the proposed list, which means a seller must obtain them at listing rather than after an offer. The bottleneck simply moves earlier unless the agent side changes too.
That is what the fee and turnaround cap is for. If it works, leasehold packs become quicker and cheaper to obtain, and the rest of the reform becomes deliverable. If it does not, upfront information for leasehold property becomes a delay at the front of the transaction instead of the middle.
Firms doing volume leasehold work should watch that cap more closely than the sales pack itself.
What should a firm do now?
Five things, none of which need legislation first.
1. Move instruction earlier. Advise seller clients to instruct before listing. This is the single highest-value change and it works today.
2. Audit the information gathering. Work out how early the firm can realistically obtain title, leasehold and search information, and where the bottlenecks sit.
3. Rework billing. If work moves forward, the payment point needs to move with it. Consider staged fees or a pack fee payable on instruction.
4. Read the code of practice on publication. Self-assess against it while it is still voluntary. Early compliance is cheap. Retrofitting is not.
5. Prepare a client note. One page separating what is announced from what is in force saves answering the same question from scratch every week.
Common mistakes
Telling clients the reforms are law. They are not. Nothing has commenced.
Assuming the pack removes work. It relocates it.
Assuming liability shifts to the seller or the agent. It does not.
Ignoring the billing consequence. Front-loaded work with back-loaded fees is a cash flow problem waiting to happen.
Waiting for the legislation before changing anything. The instruction-timing change is available now and needs no statutory basis.
Official sources
MHCLG summarised the announcement on its media blog. The underlying consultation sits on the MHCLG consultation hub.
The Legal Brief reported the roadmap in its news piece for conveyancers. It covered the last major residential change in its report on the Renters’ Rights Act coming into force.
Last updated: 1 August 2026. Nothing in this guide is yet in force. It will be revised when the agents’ code of practice is published.