The average property lawyer has seen a 25% reduction in cases year-on-year, while the top 500 firms registered a record-high 60% market share, according to data from Search Acumen.
According to its Conveyancing Market Tracker, the average property law firm handled 62 cases in the third quarter of 2023, down a quarter from the previous year – and a 41% decrease from the Q1 2022 post-pandemic peak, when firms handled an average of 94 cases per quarter. This comes against the backdrop of a sluggish property market, with Search Acumen reporting that September 2023 saw the fewest transactions in nearly three years.
However, 62 cases per quarter is in line with pre-pandemic figures, being on par with the quarterly average from 2019, which the company suggests “could be an indication of a return to traditional activity levels”.
In addition, the figures show a concentration of work going to the top 500 firms – on track for a 60% market share for the whole of 2023, compared with 51% in 2011 – while the top 100 also strengthened their share, and the overall number of active property law firms dropped below 3,900 in August for the first time outside the pandemic period. This reflects a “market rife with acquisitions and big winners”, according to Search Acumen.
Andy Sommerville, director at Search Acumen, said: “As workloads slow for property lawyers, a number of firms are making moves to consolidate in a sign of the changing demands of the real estate market. During periods of significant mergers and acquisitions, it is therefore likely that some of the larger firms may be growing due to this, [explaining] why the top 500 firms are dominating market share.
“We know a slowdown in commercial and residential property instructions is having a particular effect on caseload volumes, where the fight to win an instruction from competitors has been sharply brought into focus. The data backs up what we know anecdotally – that the adoption of technology in the legal sector is increasing at pace, allowing bigger firms to maintain a competitive advantage.
“With rapid advancement in what technology can deliver for businesses’ bottom lines, the use of tools such as AI to drive efficiencies is no longer a nice-to-have, but crucial in the race against obsolescence. Staying relevant to clients has to be critical to conveyancers at a time of market crunch.”
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