The Open Property Data Association (OPDA) has issued a formal call for industry engagement with the Government’s Smart Data Multi-Sector Call for Evidence, published by the Department for Business and Trade. The consultation, which runs until 1 October 2026, seeks views on how smart data schemes could be structured across several sectors, with property explicitly named as a priority area.
OPDA, which develops the technical standards and trust framework underpinning smart property data sharing, is encouraging participation from organisations across mortgage lending, legal services, conveyancing, surveying, valuation, insurance and proptech. The association warned that without broad industry input, future property data frameworks risk being shaped without sufficient representation from the practitioners who deliver services to consumers.
The policy landscape
The consultation sits alongside the recently published Home Buying and Selling Roadmap, led by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, which sets out a programme of reform centred on digitisation, interoperability and mandated data-sharing standards for property transactions. The two initiatives are distinct in scope: the roadmap is focused on the home buying and selling process, while the smart data programme provides the broader legislative, policy and governance architecture through which data-sharing schemes across sectors will be authorised and designed.
Maria Harris, chair of OPDA, said the smart data consultation represents the mechanism by which the roadmap’s ambitions are translated into operational reality. “The Home Buying and Selling Roadmap has established a clear direction of travel for property transactions. Smart Data is one of the mechanisms that turns that vision into reality by enabling secure and trusted access to the information that consumers, professionals and organisations need,” she said.
Harris also acknowledged that the growing number of parallel workstreams, spanning government departments, working groups and industry bodies, has created some confusion about where responsibility sits. She stressed that the smart data programme provides the overarching framework into which sector-specific work, including OPDA’s own standards development, feeds.
Regulatory and commercial read-across
The call for evidence sits within a broader UK policy direction toward data portability and consumer-controlled data sharing, a trajectory that has already reshaped financial services through open banking and is now extending into adjacent sectors including energy and telecoms. Property has long been identified as a sector where information asymmetry, fragmented data custody and manual verification processes contribute materially to transaction delays and fall-through rates.
For lenders and mortgage technology providers, the stakes are practical. A well-designed smart data framework for property could accelerate automated valuation, reduce duplicated verification checks and support faster conveyancing timelines. Those gains depend, however, on whether the final scheme design mandates or merely incentivises data sharing, and whether common technical standards are adopted at sufficient scale.
OPDA’s own position as the body developing property data standards means it has a clear interest in the consultation’s outcome. The association sits on the Digital Property Market Steering Group alongside MHCLG and the Department for Business and Trade Smart Data Council, giving it a formal channel into policy development. Industry respondents who have not yet engaged with OPDA’s standards work may find the consultation a useful entry point into a debate that is moving toward regulatory proposals.
The consultation is open at the Department for Business and Trade and closes 1 October 2026.
