Why siloed innovation is slowing progress in the housing market – Harris

Yet despite this plethora of technology, the home buying process remains a poor experience for customers and the industry.

Why? Because much of this innovation happens in isolation. Estate agents, lenders, conveyancers, brokers and technology solutions each develop their own systems and platforms focused on improving the part of the home buying process they’re engaged in. But few of those innovations are created collaboratively and even fewer speak to one another.

Instead of solving the industry’s long-standing problems and building around the centricity of the customer experience, we’ve simply shifted them into digital silos. Without shared standards and interoperability, we’ve arguably made the process harder, not better.

A fragmented experience for buyers and professionals alike

For a homebuyer, the mortgage process can feel like navigating a maze of disconnected and inefficient tasks. They’re asked to provide the same information multiple times, verify their identity through various channels, and chase updates from different parties who are often working from entirely separate systems.

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For the agents, brokers, lenders, surveyors and conveyancers supporting them, it’s equally frustrating. Important information isn’t available when it would be most useful, and then it has to be rekeyed between platforms, documents need to be cross-verified, and confusion over who holds the latest version of what adds to delays, duplication and fall-throughs.

Innovation should streamline this journey. Instead, it has created layers of complexity where platforms don’t integrate, digital tools are optimised for internal efficiency rather than end-to-end collaboration, and behavioural change doesn’t reflect the technical change.

Innovation without interoperability isn’t progress

We’ve reached a point where digital solutions are not enough. To truly fix the home buying experience, we need connected digital infrastructure underpinned by commonly adopted data formats and trust standards.

That’s where initiatives like the Property Data Trust Framework (PDTF) come in. By providing a common structure for how property data is captured, verified and shared, the Property Data Trust Framework allows different systems to interact reliably and securely. It enables a flow of information, not just between systems, but between stakeholders, reducing friction across the entire process.

With the Data (Use and Access) Act and the Industrial Strategy supporting digitisation and smart data for the property market, there’s a legislative and policy shift underway that executes and accelerates these efforts. Regulation alone won’t fix the problem; adoption, alignment, and long-lasting cultural change across the industry will.

The cost of failing to connect

When innovation doesn’t connect, the cost is commercial as well as technical. Delays and fall-throughs cost businesses (and consumers) money. Repeated tasks slow down pipelines and stretch resources, and customers lose confidence in a process that should feel exciting, not exhausting.

It’s not that we need more tools. We need the technology and the industry working together in a consistent, secure and customer-first way. That means lenders, advisers, tech providers and property professionals aligning behind shared standards, frameworks, and ways of working. It means building for integration, not isolation. And it means thinking beyond short-term fixes to long-term transformation.

The data standards and ways of working we need for a smarter, more seamless transaction process already exist. To deliver this for all customers, the industry must put aside competition and collaborate on the fundamentals – shared data standards and interoperable systems – with a commitment to putting the customer at the heart of innovation.