Quick answer: Blockchain property verification doesn’t replace the conveyancing lawyer — it changes which parts of the file are easy versus hard. The Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023 (effective 15 July 2023) sets the scale fees a Malaysian conveyancing solicitor charges, but doesn’t dictate where the hours go. Verification compresses vendor diligence, identity confirmation and project-compliance checks, so the solicitor’s time goes where only the solicitor can add value: drafting, advising, completion, and the judgement calls that carry professional liability.
We’ve spent the past three months in this column telling buyers, agents and developers that they still need a Malaysian conveyancing lawyer. We meant it every time. Today we want to put the same argument from the other side of the desk — for the practising conveyancing solicitor reading this — because the verification conversation has so far been pitched at everyone except the profession most directly affected by it.
Here’s the question we keep hearing from Malaysian conveyancing lawyers, in various forms: “If buyers can check on a blockchain that the developer is who they say they are, the title is what it says it is, and the project is real, where does that leave me?” The honest answer is: exactly where you were, just with the front end of the file already done. This article walks through where verification fits in a normal conveyancing matter, what it changes for your practice, and where the new tools genuinely don’t reach.
The legal architecture verification sits within
To be clear about what verification is and isn’t, it helps to be clear about what conveyancing is in Malaysia first.
The Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023 (“SRO 2023”) was passed by the Solicitors’ Costs Committee under section 113 of the Legal Profession Act 1976, gazetted on 12 July 2023 and effective 15 July 2023 (Malaysian Bar / Bar Council Conveyancing Practice Committee, Circular 258/2023). It sets the scale fees: 1.25% on the first RM500,000 (minimum RM500), 1% from RM500,000 to RM7.5 million, and negotiable (not exceeding 1%) above that. HDA-governed transactions attract automatic discounts on Table A — 75% of scale below RM250,000, 70% to RM500,000, 65% to RM1 million, and 50% above (Conventus Law analysis of SRO 2023; CCS Co., 2023). Solicitors may discount up to 25% on Table A; no discount on Tables B, Second, Fourth, Fifth or Sixth Schedules.
What the SRO 2023 doesn’t do — and what nothing in the Legal Profession Act 1976 does — is dictate how the solicitor spends the hours that scale fee covers. Whether a conveyancing matter takes thirty hours or sixty, whether vendor diligence eats half the file or a tenth, whether the file completes in 60 days or 120: those are practice-management questions. They affect realisation rates, risk exposure, and how many matters a fee-earner can carry. They are also exactly what verification changes.
Verification, in the form Stellarise builds it, is a Verified Owner record on a public blockchain — voluntarily published by the property owner or developer, confirming ownership against the relevant land registry. It is not a substitute for any statutory check. It does not replace State Authority Consent under section 433B of the National Land Code, it does not replace the SPA (which in HDA matters must use Schedule G/H/I/J), it does not replace your Land Office search, and it certainly does not replace your professional judgement. What it does is publish, in advance and immutably, the underlying facts you would otherwise have to establish from scratch on every file.
What verification compresses
Think of a typical residential conveyancing matter as having three layers: facts that can be pre-confirmed (and so should be), drafting and advice that require the solicitor’s skill, and procedural steps that only the solicitor can perform on the client’s behalf. Verification reaches the first layer, leaves the second and third entirely alone.
Identity confirmation of the vendor or developer. On an unverified matter you confirm the vendor’s identity from the SPA, NRIC, and company search; on a developer purchase, from the developer’s APDL and KPKT registration. On a verified matter, the on-chain record cryptographically ties the vendor’s licensed entity to the project from minting, with the underlying KPKT and Land Office data already matched. You still check it — that’s basic prudence — but you check a single anchored record rather than chasing primary documents.
Vendor capacity and standing. Whether the vendor has the right to sell (clean title, no undisclosed co-owners, no charges you weren’t told about) is the question that quietly takes the most time on most files. A verified record gives you a clean starting point for the title search — not a substitute for it, but a strong indicator that the vendor isn’t pulling a fast one. If the verified record and the SLA / Land Office title don’t match, that’s a red flag you’d want to see early. Which is the point: you see it early, not at the SPA-signing stage.
Project compliance for new developments. APDL number, project approval, construction progress, blacklist status, and Housing Development Account compliance — all live and queryable through KPKT’s TEDUH portal, all already anchored in a verified record. You still review and document, but the documents you’re reviewing are pre-validated rather than first-touch.
The new eSPA layer. From 1 January 2026, every regulated residential SPA must be auto-generated and digitally signed via HIMS/iDsaya, stored encrypted in TEDUH (KPKT / The Edge Malaysia, February 2026). Physical SPA signatures are no longer accepted for HDA matters. Verification interlocks naturally with eSPA — the hash of the executed eSPA can be anchored on-chain, giving an immutable timestamp on top of the government’s own digital trail. This isn’t a new compliance burden; it’s the existing one made cleaner.
What verification doesn’t reach — and shouldn’t
Equally important is being honest about what verification can’t and shouldn’t try to do. The boundary matters because anyone selling verification as a substitute for the conveyancing role is selling something other than what we’re describing.
| Conveyancing function | Verification’s reach |
| Drafting and reviewing the SPA terms | No reach — solicitor’s work entirely |
| Advising on tax exposure (RPGT, stamp duty, MoT) | No reach |
| Section 433B State Authority Consent application | No reach — procedural work the solicitor performs |
| Land Office title search and adjudication | Partial — TEDUH is a project/developer check, not a live title search |
| Negotiating conditional terms (financing, vacant possession dates) | No reach |
| Stamping, registration, completion accounts | No reach |
| Advising on co-ownership, probate, encumbrances | No reach |
| Professional liability for the advice given | No reach — sits where it always sat, with the solicitor |
The pattern is consistent: verification touches the factual layer (who, what, when), not the advisory or procedural layer. A solicitor’s value has always sat in the advisory and procedural layers, which is why the SRO 2023 scale fees apply to the matter as a whole rather than to particular tasks within it. Verification doesn’t change what the solicitor is being paid for — it changes how much friction sits in front of them when they sit down to do it.
What this changes for your practice
The practical effect on a conveyancing practice is the kind of change that compounds slowly but matters.
Realisation rates rise on HDA matters. HDA discounts on Table A are statutory; you can’t avoid them. The scale fee on an RM800,000 HDA matter is fixed at 65% of the RM500,000–RM1m band rate. What’s variable is the hours you put in to earn that fee. Verification removes (or reduces) several front-end tasks that previously had to be done from scratch on every file — and on the most discounted category of file at that. A practice that adopts verification as a standard input early sees realisation on HDA work improve before competitors do.
Front-end risk drops. A meaningful share of conveyancing professional negligence exposure sits in the early diligence phase: missed encumbrances, failure to spot a corporate identity issue, taking a developer’s representations on trust. Verification adds an independent, immutable cross-check at exactly the point you’re forming your initial view of the matter. It doesn’t transfer liability — that remains yours — but it widens the evidence base your judgement is being made against, which is risk-reducing.
Cross-border instructions become easier to accept. Singapore-based buyers buying in Johor are a growing share of the matters Iskandar and JB conveyancing practices are being asked to take on. The hardest part of those files is the diligence the buyer expected to do themselves but can’t, because they’re in another country. A verified record from the developer gives the cross-border buyer something tangible to rely on while you do the live legal work. That, in turn, makes the buyer easier to advise — they arrive at the SPA stage already convinced about the basics, so your time goes to the conditional terms that actually need negotiation.
The professional positioning gets sharper. A lawyer who can say to a client “I review the verified record, I run the live searches that verification can’t replace, and I take professional responsibility for the advice that follows” is a lawyer the client understands. Verification, used well, makes the conveyancing solicitor’s distinct value more visible, not less.
A small example, end-to-end
Consider an actual file: a Singapore-based buyer purchasing a strata unit in Iskandar Puteri at RM1.1 million, off-plan from a major developer, financed through a Singapore bank with a Malaysian conveyancing referral.
On the unverified version of that file you’d spend the first ten to fifteen hours establishing facts the developer could already prove: APDL number current, project approval in order, developer entity in good standing, title status of the underlying land, beneficial ownership of the developing SPV. You’d build all of this from primary documents, against multiple databases, with the client emailing you twice a week for updates.
On the verified version you’d see all of that in the first thirty minutes — anchored, cryptographically linked, KPKT-matched, Land-Office-matched, dated. A Singaporean buyer should engage a Malaysian property lawyer to conduct a live Land Office title search, review and draft conditional SPA terms and handle the Johor State Authority Consent, stamping (MOT 8% for foreigners) and completYou’d still verify the verification (no responsible solicitor would just take it on trust), but verifying an existing record takes a fraction of the time of building one. Those ten to fifteen hours get reallocated to where they actually need to go: the financing structure, the cross-border tax position, the conditional terms in the SPA, the State Authority Consent application, the Singapore-side stamp position, completion accounts.
The client gets a faster, lower-stress matter. You get more time to spend on advisory work that the SRO 2023 scale fee was set to cover anyway. Realisation goes up. Risk goes down. Nothing has been substituted out — the work is just redistributed to where it should always have been.
What we’d ask the conveyancing profession to consider
We’ll be direct, because the profession appreciates directness more than marketing. Verification is going to become a normal part of Malaysian property transactions over the next three to five years. The reasons are structural — the eSPA mandate is live, the Real Property Development Bill is moving, KPKT is signalling escrow reform, and cross-border buyer volumes are rising. Voluntary verification sits naturally on top of that direction, not against it. The question for individual practices is not whether to engage with it but when.
Early adopters of verification as a standard input get three things: better realisation on HDA work, lower professional-negligence exposure on the front end, and a positioning that distinguishes them from the panel-conveyancing volume model that dominates the lower end of the market. The practices that wait will get there eventually — they’ll just arrive after the trust-segment work has already moved.
Stellarise’s interest in this isn’t disinterested — we build the verification rail and we benefit when serious developers and lawyers use it. But the argument stands independently of who’s making it. The conveyancing lawyer’s role is not threatened by verification; it’s clarified by it. The lawyer remains indispensable. The diligence just moves to where it actually adds value.
Frequently asked questions
Does a Verified Owner record have any legal status in a Malaysian conveyancing matter?
Not in the sense that it replaces statutory requirements. The authoritative legal sources for ownership and title in Malaysia remain the Land Office records under the National Land Code, KPKT for developer licensing and project status, and the SPA itself (in HDA matters, the prescribed Schedule G/H/I/J). A Verified Owner record is provided for informational purposes only. They do not confer legal status, do not transfer liability and do not constitute an indemnity. Treat it the way you’d treat any other helpful pre-completed information from a counterparty: useful, time-saving, but always subject to your own verification before you advise.
How does verification interact with the SRO 2023 scale fees?
It doesn’t, directly. SRO 2023 governs what you charge, not how you spend the time. The scale-fee rates and HDA discount tiers — 1.25% on the first RM500,000, 1% on the next RM7,000,000 and the amount exceeding RM7.5M is negotiable but capped at 1% of the excess; for HDA matters the automatic discount are 75% for RM50,000-RM250,000, 70%for above RM250,000-RM500,000, 65% for above RM500,000-RM1M and 50% for above RM1M (Conventus Law / Malaysian Bar, 2023) — apply to your matter regardless of whether verification is in play. What verification affects is your realisation rate against that fee: if vendor diligence and project compliance take less time, more of the fee converts to margin, and more of your time is available for work that compounds (advisory, repeat instructions, referrals). The SRO and verification operate on different layers and don’t conflict.
What happens if I rely on a verification record and it turns out to be wrong?
If a verification record turns out to be wrong, liability Is determined by whether your reliance was reasonable in the circumstances and whether you took independent steps to verify the underlying facts. A verification record is a starting point, not an endpoint, it reflects the state at the time of verification, whereas only a live Land Office search confirms the current legal position. Your duty of care rests on the live search; the record does not lower that duty and may simply make subsequent checks more efficient by providing a baseline. Neither professional indemnity coverage nor the rules of professional conduct under the Legal Profession Act 1976 are altered by reliance on a verification record.
Does verification work with the new eSPA / HIMS system?
It complements it cleanly. The mandatory eSPA from 1 January 2026 (KPKT / The Edge Malaysia, February 2026) means every regulated residential SPA is auto-generated by HIMS, digitally signed via iDsaya, and stored encrypted in TEDUH — physical SPA signatures are no longer accepted for HDA matters. Verification can anchor the hash of the executed eSPA on a public blockchain, adding an independent immutable timestamp on top of the government’s digital trail. For solicitors this isn’t an additional compliance step; it’s an additional evidentiary safeguard for matters where buyer-side concerns about long-term record integrity are likely to arise — which is most cross-border and high-value matters.
Are Iskandar and JB conveyancing practices seeing more cross-border instructions because of the JS-SEZ and RTS Link?
Yes, and the trend is accelerating. The Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone was formally established on 7 January 2025 (PwC Malaysia, 2026), and the RTS Link is on track for service by end-2026 with full operations from 1 January 2027 (Land Transport Authority, February 2026). Singaporeans now represent over 40% of property inquiries in JB (Bamboo Routes, January 2026). Many of those buyers are working through a Singapore-based agent who will refer them to a Malaysian conveyancing firm — sometimes the developer’s panel firm, sometimes an independent one. The independent-instruction share is rising as buyers become more sophisticated, and the practices best positioned for that growth are the ones that can demonstrate cross-border-aware service: digital file handling, English-language SPA review, awareness of the buyer’s Singapore-side stamp and tax position, and — increasingly — comfort with verified-input files.
Is Stellarise asking lawyers to do anything specific?
No. The verification rail is something developers and property owners voluntarily commission for their own listings; lawyers don’t need to “join” anything to handle a verified matter, any more than a lawyer needs to “join” KPKT to use TEDUH data. What we’d suggest, if you handle Malaysian conveyancing and you’re seeing cross-border or off-plan work, is becoming familiar with how Verified Owner records appear in practice — what data they anchor, what they don’t, and how to integrate the check into your usual diligence sequence. There’s no fee, no licence, and no rule change. It’s a tool your clients will increasingly arrive carrying, and the practices that know how to read it efficiently will spend less time on the front end of every file.
Sources & References
• Malaysian Bar / Bar Council Conveyancing Practice Committee. Circular 258/2023 — Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023 (19 September 2023). Scale fees, HDA discount tiers, Table A discount cap.
• Conventus Law. “Malaysia — The Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023” (September 2023). SRO 2023 under s 113 Legal Profession Act 1976; gazetted 12 July 2023, effective 15 July 2023.
• CCS Co. Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023. Scale fee bands; HDA discount.
• JY Ko Advocates & Solicitors. “Solicitors’ Remuneration Order 2023: A Comprehensive Guide” (February 2026). SRO 2023 schedules and discount provisions.
• Mah Weng Kwai & Associates. “Recent Amendments to the Solicitors’ Remuneration Order” (June 2024). Comparison with SRO 2005 and 2017 amendments.
• KPKT. TEDUH portal. Developer licence, APDL, project status, blacklist.
• KPKT / The Edge Malaysia. “Know Your Stuff: Electronic sales and purchase agreement (eSPA)” (February 2026). Mandatory eSPA from 1 January 2026.
• MIDA / PwC Malaysia. Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone. JS-SEZ established 7 January 2025.
• Land Transport Authority (Singapore). JB–Singapore RTS Link project. End-2026 passenger service.
• Bamboo Routes. Johor latest rental yields data 2026 (January 2026). 40% Singapore inquiries.
• Housing Development (Control and Licensing) Act 1966 (Act 118), Malaysia.
• National Land Code 1965 (Act 56), Malaysia. Section 433B (foreigner consent).
• Legal Profession Act 1976 (Act 166), Malaysia. Section 113 (Solicitors’ Costs Committee).
