How Hauscope values properties

• Land Registry Price Paid Data — the full record of residential sales in England & Wales (around 28 million transactions), updated monthly. This is the backbone of the comparable-sales engine.
• EPC Register — floor area, current & potential energy rating, and primary heating fuel. Used to anchor price-per-square-foot and to flag leasehold / new-build risks.
• ONS House Price Index — used to adjust historical sale prices to current values, so a comparable that sold 18 months ago is priced as it would likely trade today.
• Rightmove — asking price, listing history, and property details for the specific property being analysed only. Rightmove is never used as a source of comparable evidence.

Comparables are recent sold properties in the same neighbourhood as the subject. The selection is weighted by proximity (same postcode, same district, nearby district), recency (the last 18 months preferred, falling back to 30 months when evidence is thin), property type (flat, terraced, semi-detached, detached), and bedroom count. Prices are then adjusted for market movement using the ONS House Price Index so the evidence sits on a common present-day basis.

When the subject property’s floor area is known, comparables are further filtered to a ±20% sqft band. For flats and maisonettes, the comparable set is also restricted to the same tenure type as the subject (freehold or leasehold), because lease length and ground-rent structure materially affect value.

Every valuation carries an explicit confidence tier. This is separate from the valuation itself; it describes how much weight you should place on the numbers you’re reading.

• High confidence — six or more well-matched comparables, prices tightly clustered around the median, no bimodal split. The verdict is delivered as a point estimate with a defined range.
• Medium confidence — at least four comparables with a workable spread. The point estimate is given, but the score is capped to reflect residual uncertainty.
• Hedged — when comparable evidence is thin, widely spread, or splits into two distinct clusters, Hauscope refuses to commit to a single number. Instead you see the full range of comparable prices, where the asking price sits inside that range, and a plain description of why the evidence is mixed.

When comparable evidence is tight and plentiful, we produce a confident valuation. When evidence is mixed or thin, we tell you plainly — showing a range instead of a point estimate.

• We cannot see inside properties. Condition, recent renovation, specification, and interior layout are not visible in public data and are not captured by the comparables engine. Two otherwise identical houses on the same street can be worth meaningfully different sums.
• Leasehold complexities — lease length, ground-rent escalators, service charge structures — are not always available in public records. For leasehold flats with less than 80 years remaining, this gap matters.
• New-build pricing typically carries a premium of roughly 10–20% over comparable existing stock. Because Land Registry records the initial transaction at the premium, the bias can persist in comparables for several years after a development completes.

Hauscope provides decision support based on public property data. It is not a RICS-regulated valuation and should not replace a professional survey for mortgage, legal, or financial decisions.