[ck425]

In England you mean. I'm not sure about Wales or NI but the system in Scotland is much better and still has similarly low fee's.

In Scotland sellers are legally required to provide a survey to potential buyer, known as the Home Report, which covers all the basics. While it doesn't go indepth on specific issues it does normally highlight them in the first place so you're far less likely to uncover surprise issues after buying. And if it does find potentially major issues the seller will often pay for a more indepth survey or to just get it fixed themselves as otherwise no one will consider the property. For example the home report for the first property I bought found damp which put most people off so the seller paid for a damp survey and quote to fix which they added to the HR. Even then it put a lot of people off and I got it £3k under valuation despite the quote to fix the damp being only £1.8k.

Also I'm not sure if it's the same down in England but "estate agents" in Scotland are all solicitors and thus regulated. Plus when you sell it's one fee to one company for everything and there's no faff about info going between agents and solicitors.