Can You Do Your Own Local Authority Searches?

It's a fair question, and it comes up more than you'd think. Local authority records are public. The local land charges register is open to inspection. So if the information is there for anyone to look at, why pay someone to look at it for you?

The short answer: you can do your own search. You just can't use it to buy a house with a mortgage. There's a gap between what's technically possible and what a lender will accept, and that gap is exactly where personal search companies live.

Can you legally do your own local authority search?

Yes. Local authority property records are public. Anyone can inspect the local land charges register and put enquiries to the council about a property. A "personal search" is literally that: a search of public records compiled by someone other than the council itself.

This is the part people are usually surprised by. The information isn't secret. The LLC1 comes from the local land charges register, which HM Land Registry is steadily migrating online. The CON29 is a set of standard enquiries the council answers about the property. None of it is locked away.

So in principle, a determined buyer could compile their own. The records are there. The forms are public. Nothing stops you reading them.

The problem isn't access. It's what happens next.

Why won't a lender accept a search you did yourself?

Because a DIY search carries no insurance and meets no recognised standard. Lender acceptance of searches is set lender by lender in the UK Finance Mortgage Lenders' Handbook (Part 2, clause 5.4). Lenders require a search produced to a known quality bar and backed by professional indemnity cover. A buyer working alone can offer neither.

Think about what the lender is protecting. They're advancing most of the purchase price against the property. If the search misses a planning enforcement notice, a road-widening scheme, or a charge against the title, the property may be worth far less than the loan. The lender wants someone accountable if the search is wrong.

A DIY buyer is accountable to nobody but themselves. There's no insurer behind the work and no complaints process. So lenders simply won't take it.

That leaves two accepted routes: the council's official search, or a regulated personal search from a registered firm. Both carry the backing a lender needs.

What is a personal search company, exactly?

A personal search company compiles the property searches a conveyancer needs before a sale completes: local authority (CON29 and LLC1), drainage and water, environmental and more. It accesses the same public records the council would, produces a regulated and insured result, and returns it to the solicitor. It is the firm that produces the searches.

This is worth being precise about, because the term gets muddled. A personal search company is not an AI tool, and it's not a buying agent who finds you a house. It's a specialist firm that does the search work professionally, to the Search Code standard, with insurance behind it.

In other words: it does, properly and accountably, the exact thing a buyer technically could do but in practice can't. That's the whole proposition. You're not paying for access to records. You're paying for the regulated, insured, accepted version of the result.

"People think they're buying access to information. They're not — that's free. They're buying the version a lender will accept, with someone standing behind it if it's wrong. That's the difference, and it's the whole business."

— Valerie Bennett, Personal Search Veteran · June 2026

DIY vs regulated personal search vs official: what actually differs

The three routes look similar on paper. They diverge sharply on acceptance, insurance and recourse. Here's how they compare for a mortgaged purchase.

The DIY column is the giveaway. Same records, no insurance, no acceptance, no recourse. You'd carry all the risk yourself, on a transaction worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, to save the cost of a search. Nobody sensible does that with a mortgage involved.

For the difference between the two accepted routes, see regulated vs official and our deeper look at personal search vs official.

What makes a personal search "regulated"?

The Search Code. A regulated personal search comes from a firm that subscribes to the Search Code, holds adequate professional indemnity insurance, and follows a defined complaints process. That registration is what turns a private search of public records into something a lender will accept.

The Search Code is sponsored by CoPSO (the Council of Property Search Organisations) and independently monitored by the Property Codes Compliance Board (PCCB). Consumer redress runs through The Property Ombudsman. Subscribing firms commit to quality standards, adequate insurance and clear handling if something goes wrong.

This is the bit a DIY buyer can never replicate. You can read the same register. You cannot make yourself Search Code-registered, insured and accountable on a one-off basis. The regulation isn't bureaucracy for its own sake — it's the mechanism that makes the search trustworthy enough to lend against.

So in practice, who does the search?

In practice, the buyer's conveyancer instructs a personal search company. The buyer rarely touches it. The solicitor or licensed conveyancer orders the searches as part of the conveyancing process, the personal search firm compiles them, and the result comes back ready for the transaction.

That's the chain. Buyer instructs conveyancer. Conveyancer instructs the search firm. Search firm produces the regulated, insured result and returns it. Everyone in that chain is accountable to the one before them, which is exactly what the lender wants to see.

If you're a conveyancer choosing a search provider, the questions to ask are simple: are they Search Code registered, what's their turnaround, and will the lender on this deal accept their work? Get those right and the search stops being a worry.

For the full picture of how the searches fit together, start with conveyancing searches explained. And if you run or order searches and want to see how the work is produced end to end, here's how Valio works.

Conveyancing searches explained → · Regulated vs official → · How Valio works →