A friend recently asked me to give his son some advice about a career in estate agency. I did my best to help him but in the process of doing so I realised that it would be almost impossible for him to do what I did when I started.

I took my first estate agency job in 1980. I was given a tiny basic salary and a generous commission package which enabled me to quadruple my earnings in my first year. I was made a branch manager after 13 months’ service and a partner less than two years later.

After my firm was sold, I was entrusted with the job of building a regional chain of estate agents for Norwich Union (now Aviva).

Norwich Union closed their appointed representative division in 1991 and had no further need for an estate agency chain so I was asked to help them sell all the offices back to their managers. This was what gave me the idea to set myself up as a specialist broker selling estate agency businesses.

I started Adam J Walker and Associates in 1992 with the help of a loan from Barclays Bank. The loan was granted by my bank manager of 10 years, Mr Bindefeld. I was not asked to give any sort of personal guarantee for the loan and things went so well that I was able to repay it in full within two years.

Barriers to entry

Forty-five years later it would be neigh on impossible for my friend’s son to replicate any part of what I was able to achieve. The first hurdle would be getting a first job in estate agency. Recent and proposed legislation has made this much more difficult. My basic salary would have been way below the minimum wage.

The increase in employers’ National Insurance contributions and the lowering of the threshold has made employing apprentices far more expensive.”

The increase in employers’ National Insurance contributions and the lowering of the threshold has made employing apprentices far more expensive. It has also closed the gap between the cost of taking on a trainee versus taking on someone with experience so employers will naturally do that.

Other factors are the huge rise in corporation tax from 19% to 25% which means that employers have less money available to invest in growing their business, and the reluctance of family-owned businesses to invest in growing their businesses because they will soon have to pay 20% tax if they pass them onto their children.

The biggest factor however is the forthcoming change in employment legislation which will give new employees rights from the moment they start their new job and make it much more difficult to dismiss them no matter how useless they are.

It will be very difficult  for him to open or buy his own business because it is almost impossible to get a bank loan.”

Even if my friend’s son is able to overcome all these hurdles and achieve a successful career in estate agency, it will be very difficult  for him to take the next step and open or buy his own business because it is almost impossible to get a bank loan. If one is granted, then the bank will want an unlimited personal guarantee which completely changes the risk to reward ratio.

Over the last 45 years the businesses that I have created have created a great many well-paid jobs and have generated many millions of pounds of tax revenue for the government, but achieving this again today would be difficult if not impossible.

A plea to Reeves

If Rachel Reeves is serious about growing our economy she needs to focus on addressing core issues such as the minimum wage, reducing National Insurance, reducing Corporation Tax, cancelling the legislation that gives new joiners employment rights on Day One and making bank finance easier to obtain.

Please give a young estate agents chance to get their foot on the career ladder.”

Building a third runway at Heathrow Airport in 15 or 20 years’ time or building a new railway line to link Oxford and Cambridge in five or 10 years’ time is not going to do it. We need action that will have an impact immediately.

In the meanwhile if you are an employer, then please for the good of our country and all our features, please give a young estate agents chance to get their foot on the career ladder, even if it does not make financial sense to do so.