Article 4 - What Are We Going to Count Now?

We may soon have more fully registered practitioners - while the statistics appear to show fewer.

This might be the most interesting unintended consequence of the 2026 reform.Historically, becoming a full Non-Principal Property Practitioner and receiving the PPRE - Professional Practitioner in Real Estate - designation were closely connected.

The PPRA's 2024/25 Annual Report recorded 2,308 PPRE designations during the year. (PPRA)

It was therefore tempting to look at PPRE awards as an indication of how many practitioners were successfully progressing through the professional pathway.From August 2026, that no longer works.

The PPRA expressly states that a person entering through the new competency pathway may qualify for registration as a Non-Principal but, because they do not hold the prescribed formal real-estate qualification, they will not be entitled to the PPRE designation. (PPRA)

So imagine this scenario.
    One year the PPRA awards 2,300 PPRE designations.
    The following year it awards only 1,800.

At face value you might conclude:
    Professionalisation is going backwards.

But what if another 2,500 people became lawful Non-Principal practitioners through the competency pathway during that same year?

Then actual progression might have risen dramatically.

The measurement simply failed to capture it.

This is why the distinction we uncovered earlier matters so much:
“Registered to practise”,
“demonstrably competent”,
“formally qualified”
and “professionally designated” are no longer necessarily the same thing.

None of those statuses is meaningless.

They simply answer different questions. 
   Registration answers:
May this person legally practise?
    Competency asks:
Has this person demonstrated the required ability?
    Qualification asks:
Has this person completed a recognised formal learning programme? 
   Designation asks:
Has this professional title been conferred?

The reform does not require us to pretend those four concepts are identical.

    It requires us to become better at recording them.

This is also how we protect practitioners who followed the traditional route.

Someone who spent time and money earning an NQF4 qualification and PPRE designation has not suddenly achieved “nothing” because another person can now reach Non-Principal status differently.

    Their qualification remains a qualification.
    Their designation remains a designation.

But the new entrant's lawful registration must also be recognised accurately.

That means PPRA reporting should arguably begin distinguishing:

qualification-route Non-Principals;
competency-route Non-Principals;
qualification status;
designation status;
and eventual progression to Principal.

Even that is not enough.We should also measure cohorts.

How many Candidates entering in a particular year became Non-Principals within six months?
    Within 12 months?
    How much did it cost?
    How many remained active after two years?
    How many eventually became Principals?

And, crucially for consumer protection:
Are complaint, disciplinary or compliance outcomes materially different between the pathways?

If competency-route practitioners perform just as well, we will have evidence that the reform worked.If they perform materially worse, we will have evidence that the pathway needs intervention.

That is how regulation should evolve.
    Not ideology
.    Not assumptions.
    Evidence.

So perhaps one of the biggest questions for PPRA is:

How will we know whether this reform succeeds?

Because if we continue measuring only PPRE designations, we may not know at all.