Survival will be the ‘name of the game’ in conveyancing over the next year, as practitioners forecast falling sales and more job cuts, with medium-sized firms hardest hit.

Peter Rodd, chairman of the Law Society’s property section, predicted ‘a dire market without any sign of improvement for most of 2009’.

The government’s decision to end first-day marketing from April, a concession that had allowed properties to be put on the market before home information packs were completed, would hold up sales of properties coming on to the market, Rodd said.

‘Unless firms can support their conveyancing work with other departments there will be more job losses,’ he said. ‘The name of the game for the next 12 months is survival.’

Law Society President Paul Marsh said there would be no sign of recovery until autumn at the earliest, but he did not expect to see many more redundancies as firms had generally acted promptly and already reduced staff.

Marsh advised firms to use the slowdown to examine their processes, technology and marketing, to ensure they are in the best position to get work when it becomes available.

Mark Riddick, chairman of the E-Homebuying Forum, predicted a bleak year with fewer sales than in 2008. ‘Medium-sized firms with three to four branches, which do not have the flexibility to reduce costs like smaller high-street firms and lack the cashflow of large-volume outfits, will be hardest hit,’ said Riddick. ‘At the volume end we’ll see further consolidation with fewer even larger firms.

‘The key to survival is reducing your operating costs. Modernising processes by embracing technology offers an opportunity to do this,’ he added.

Richard Barnett, chairman of the Law Society’s conveyancing and land law committee and senior partner at volume conveyancer Barnetts, said new areas of work would emerge for some, such as advice on mis-sold mortgages.

‘The challenge for us now is to be poised to respond to the upturn and the opportunities it will bring, but demonstrate flexibility and resilience until that time comes,’ he said.