A contract of sale is assembled from dozens of documents, by different people, at different times. Sometimes they disagree. Here's what that looked like across 1,410 Victorian contracts.
It's the contract. The special conditions. The vendor statement. A title search. A plan. A planning certificate. Building permits. Owners corporation records. Sometimes a pool certificate, an insurance policy or a defects report.
Each comes from somewhere different. The council. The land registry. The water authority. A builder. The seller.
Most of the time, they line up.
Sometimes, they don't.
Share of 1,410 Victorian contracts with a published Prepared review, 1 February to 31 August 2026. Categories overlap.
68 contracts, about one in twenty, said one thing about building works in the vendor statement while the attachments said another.
The patterns repeated:
None of this means the work was done badly. It means the vendor statement and the attachments tell different stories, and someone needs to establish which is right.
In 14 contracts, the planning report showed the land was in a designated bushfire prone area, but the seller's disclosure said it wasn't.
That matters because bushfire prone designation can affect the building standards that apply to new work, including an extension.
In 157 contracts (11%), the standard goods warranty in the general conditions couldn't be found. That usually means the contract is on a non-standard template.
It isn't necessarily a problem. It does mean your position on fixtures and fittings depends on whatever the contract says instead.
In 113 contracts (8%), the GST clause or the GST tick-boxes couldn't be located.
For most established homes, GST isn't an issue. For new builds, off-the-plan purchases and some vacant land, it can be. Where the contract doesn't make the position clear, it's worth clarifying.
In 23 contracts, the settlement date pages had been struck out, overwritten or corrected by hand.
In 6, the seller's name didn't match the name on the title, and nothing in the contract showed why the seller had the right to sell. There's often a simple explanation, like a deceased estate or a change of name. It still needs one.
It doesn't mean contracts are careless. They're assembled quickly, from many sources, and most mismatches are resolved with a phone call.
It doesn't mean anyone is hiding anything.
It means a contract can disagree with itself in ways you won't see unless someone puts the pages side by side.
Reading a contract isn't only checking what's in it. It's checking that the pieces agree with each other.
A disclosure on page 12 and an attachment on page 71 can say different things. Neither will point you to the other.
When they don't match, the right move is simple. Ask the question before you sign.
Send us your contract.
A Prepared lawyer reads your contract the same day, for free, and flags where the documents don't agree with each other.
Based on 1,410 Victorian contracts of sale that received a published Prepared review between 1 February and 31 August 2026, across metropolitan Melbourne and weighted towards the eastern and north-eastern suburbs.
A finding is counted where a qualified reviewer confirmed it and it appeared on the published review.
A contradiction is recorded where the reviewer found a conflict between the vendor statement and the documents supplied with it. We make no finding about which document was correct, or why they differed.
This analysis describes what appeared in the contracts reviewed by Prepared and should not be taken as legal advice for a particular transaction.