The building surveying profession is suffering from a serious skills shortage and more needs to be done to promote the industry to school leavers and undergraduates, according to a local expert.

Mike Sutton, a director in the building consultancy department at CB Richard Ellis in Birmingham, said there was a distinct lack of newly qualified building surveyors in the market and as a result it was becoming increasingly difficult to recruit skilled staff.

What’s more, the situation has been exacerbated by recruitment agencies artificially inflating candidates’ salary expectations.

He said the building profession needed to address the problem at source and quite literally go “back to school. The profession needs to be seen as an attractive career option for school leavers and under graduates.”

“We should be making students aware that the profession offers significant career opportunities, equal to those of law and accountancy, which still seem to attract far more students.’’

Analysis of the Building Surveying Faculty Membership undertaken by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors last year estimated that out of a core membership of 15,938 members, just 12 per cent were under the age of 35 with the average age is 44. That will be a net shortfall of 6,909 members by 2017.