Residential conveyancers should focus on landlords and investors to survive the collapse in the traditional market, property lawyers were told this week.

Yolande Barnes, director of residential research at estate agents Savills, told a Law Society property conference there is a ‘fundamental structural change’ in the property market characterised by permanently low transactions levels, a decreasing reliance on owner occupation and the increased equitisation of property.

The changes in the behaviour of house buyers, she said, have come about due to the economic climate and reduction in mortgage lending. Barnes forecast that the volume of transactions, which at under one million a year is equal to the lowest since records began in 1959, is not likely to pick up.

Barnes said the housing cycle had gone into reverse last year, with a switch from owner occupation to renting, and the phenomenon of ‘letting to rent’ where so-called ‘second steppers’ let their home to enable them to rent a bigger property to live in.

Aside from the increased focus on renting, Barnes said there is a shift from reliance on mortgagers to purchasing with cash, with private and institutional corporate investors taking the opportunity to invest in property. ‘Equity has become very important. We are seeing market polarisation between equity haves and have-nots,’ she said.

The move away from the traditional conveyancing market presents opportunities for residential conveyancers who are able to get to grips with the needs of landlords and investors. ‘Extend your focus to landlords and learn about the opportunities for investment businesses. If residential conveyancers can start to understand the needs of investors and how they can help people trade portfolios, that will help them,’ she said.

Barnes predicted that these sectors would expand and that firms able to deal with more complicated purchases and investors could gain a competitive advantage. ‘Firms should understand how to advise on co-ownership, co-investment, co-operatives and other more complicated entities, and be able to advise on equity shares and the legal processes to enable that,’ she said.