The benefits of electronic conveyancing during COVID-19

The use of electronic conveyancing systems such as PEXA has grown rapidly in recent years. In some jurisdictions, such as Victoria and New South Wales, the use of e-conveyancing is now mandatory for most standard transactions involving real property, with paper settlements becoming a rarity.

In other jurisdictions such as Queensland, the adoption process has been slower, with e-conveyancing remaining an optional alternative to (rather than a mandatory replacement for) paper settlements in most cases.

Nonetheless, the use of e-conveyancing is growing rapidly as stakeholders become more familiar with the use of these systems and recognise the advantages they offer over traditional, paper-based settlements.

With the advent of COVID-19 and recommendations from health authorities to practice social distancing and self-isolation where required, one of the key advantages of e-conveyancing – the ability to complete transactions without any requirement for parties to be physically present in the same location – is all the more relevant.

Parties who are concerned that their conveyancing transactions may be impacted by the spread of COVID-19 and the associated health directives should consider the use of e-conveyancing systems. These systems can enable parties to complete all necessary steps to bring a transaction to completion without leaving their workplace or home office.

Other benefits of e-conveyancing include:

1. Time- and cost-effectiveness: e-conveyancing avoids the need for travel and physical attendances involved in drawing cheques, attending physical settlement and lodging documents with land titles offices.
2. Adaptability: errors can be corrected and documents can be added or removed from an electronic workspace quickly and easily as a transaction evolves, often without the need for documents to be physically printed and signed.
3. Automation: documents are lodged and funds are dispersed automatically and immediately on completion of the electronic settlement.
4. Simultaneous settlements: in the past, co-ordinating multiple settlements in different locations where each is conditional on the other (such as where a purchase is conditional upon the contemporaneous sale of another property) could be a major logistical hurdle. E-conveyancing systems allow this process to be automated, with settlements completing instantly and automatically only if and when each other “linked” settlement is also ready to complete.

Now more than ever, developers, financiers, legal practitioners and other stakeholders should consider adopting or encouraging the use of e-conveyancing in their transactions. 

HopgoodGanim’s Commercial Property and Banking and Finance teams are well-versed in e-conveyancing, having been among the earliest adopters of the PEXA system.