The South African government's decision to call for tenders through the Department of Trade and Industry from suitably qualified independent investigation experts into the role and effectiveness of the Estate Agency Affairs Board could lead to a radical transformation of the estate agency sector, says Bill Rawson, Chairman of the Institute of Estate Agents of South Africa.

Reminding the general public that the Institute had actually initiated and given birth to the EAAB, Rawson said that they had asked for a regulatory body but in time this became a consumer representative organisation and in recent years had seldom performed even this role as efficiently as the Institute would have expected.

Why, therefore, does Rawson see the government investigation as such good news?

"The answer," said Rawson, "is that we in the Institute will be using the review period to undertake our own comprehensive review, after which we will make our own proposals on how the industry should be run.  Together with the thorough Department of Trade and Industry report these should provide a powerful catalyst towards the setting up of better systems."

Rawson said that the Institute had employed two big name academics, Dr Anders Aeroe, a doctor in industrial economics formerly employed as an economist by Wesgro and now at A & T Consulting, and Bridget Morony, a lawyer who has specialised in estate agency legislation.  This team will canvas a wide spectrum of property and associated industries, including financial institutions, the legal profession and mortgage originators, and by mid-January will submit a report on how they envisage the industry functioning better. 

This report, said Rawson, will cover much the same ground as the DTI investigation, i.e. the effectiveness of the estate agents' regulatory framework, a comparison of South African estate agents' regulatory models against those of other countries and an examination of the laws governing the real estate sector.

The important aspect of the Institute's investigation, said Rawson, is that the investigations will encourage all members of the public to make proposals via their local Institute branches - and as these come in, he and his PR team will publish and discuss these publicly.

"For the first time we will be airing these matters from the viewpoint of those already battling to make a living in this industry and will be drawing on the opinions and suggestions of members of the public who have experienced problems - or had successes - in property dealing."

"In the next few months a great many contentious subjects will at last be thrashed out," said Rawson.  "This is a vitally important process, particularly when one considers that we have had no public airing of estate agency affairs since the 1974/5 investigations."

Asked if this could lead to the abolition of the Estate Agency Affairs Board, Rawson said that there are estate agents keen to see this come about, but it would probably be preferable for the Board to remain in place with a number of people on it voted there by the estate agency sector.  At present, he said the Board is not making full use of the in-depth experience built up by the agencies over a long time period."