Auctioneers agree to publish accurate sales prices

ESTATE AGENTS have undertaken not to publish any house sale price figures in future other than the exact selling price.

However they claimed yesterday that as a result of the new policy, very few house prices would be published in future.

The undertaking to publish "absolutely accurate" selling prices was given yesterday following an intervention this week by the National Consumer Agency.

The agency relayed its "very serious concerns" in relation to the accuracy of private treaty sale prices that are published in newspapers.

It intervened after a letter was written by The Irish Timesto estate agents about some exaggerated sales prices being submitted for publication in its property supplement.

Having given the undertaking required, the Irish Auctioneers and Valuers Institute (IAVI) claimed yesterday it would make the property market significantly less transparent.

The institute, which has nearly 2,100 members, said the publication of actual sales prices would require the consent of both parties to a house sale under the Data Protection Act and most buyers and sellers would be reluctant to give it.

IAVI president Edward Carey said that in the absence of legislative changes, "it is likely that very few sale prices, other than the small portion of properties sold publicly at auction, will be made known to the public."

He said his organisation had advised the consumer agency "that the solution being adopted will result in a market that lacks transparency".

Mr Carey called on the Government to find a way to address the shortage of information it said would result from the changed policy "if consumers' real interests are to be served".

The IAVI believed accurate data on sales and lettings needed to be readily available to maintain a sound property market, he said.

National Consumer Agency chief executive Ann Fitzgerald dismissed the IAVI suggestion that its demand for accurate pricing information could in any way be held responsible for the property market becoming less transparent.

"The Data Protection Act is not new and under it both parties have to agree to the prices being published," she said. "Either that has been happening up to now or it hasn't and if it has not been happening, then estate agents have been in breach of that legislation for years.

"More importantly, if prices submitted to newspapers are misleading then a false market is being created and that is not in anyone's interest," Ms Fitzgerald added. "It would be better to have no prices than false prices."

Data Protection Commissioner Billy Hawkes confirmed that the prices received or paid for a property were protected by the Data Protection Acts.

He said when the information was available to a third party, such as an auctioneer, "it should not be disclosed without the consent of the parties involved, unless there is a separate legal obligation to do so".

He said any information disclosed should be accurate and there was "nothing in our data protection legislation that runs counter to the National Consumer Agency's insistence that, where sales information is published by auctioneers with vendor and purchaser consent, this information should not be misleading to consumers."

The Institute of Professional Auctioneers and Valuers (IPAV) has also given the assurances on accurate price reporting sought by the consumer agency at a meeting with it and the IAVI on Tuesday.

The IAVI said terms such as "region of", "close to" or "above" would no longer be used by its members and accepted that the publication of results, when they occurred, would have to be timely.

The National Consumer Agency welcomed the undertakings from both the IAVI and IPAV. Ms Fitzgerald said it was unacceptable for estate agents to publish the sale price of a particular house long after it has been sold "as the market may have moved in the interim and that sale price will no longer be applicable".