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Online-only agent’s ‘fee saving’ claims rejected by ASA

Ruling from regulator comes after complaint about London tube ad

Nigel Lewis

Online-only agent Housesimple.com’s claims that it can save London vendors thousands of pounds in fees compared to a traditional agent, and that it sells property three times faster than the average have been rejected by the Advertising Standard Authority (ASA) after a complaint about one of its London Underground posters.

The ruling by the ASA today means online-only agents, who often promote ‘fee saving’ as a key part of their proposition, must be more careful about the claims they make in advertisements and be more clear about the data they use to substantiate their claims.

housesimplesWithin the lengthy Housesimple ruling published today the ASA questions whether the data was London specific enough to substantiate the company’s claim that “we potentially save our average London client £18,764 in fees”.

Also, the ASA says that anyone reading the advertisement “would think that the online-only agent’s average client selling an averagely-priced home in London would be able to save that figure on fees in comparison to competing agents,” it says.

The ASA questions several aspects of the data used by Housesimple to substantiate its claims. This includes using just one competitor’s fee structure – Foxtons’ – to represent the average fees charged to London vendors, which the ASA disagrees with, and that the claimed competitor fee range of between 0.5% and 3.5%, taken from reports by the Homeowners’ Alliance were not properly sourced or explained. The ASA also said the comparison data it had used was not highlighted clearly enough.

Houseseimple’s claim that it is ‘three times faster’ at selling properties than other agents is also rejected by the ASA. It says the data from Rightmove and Home.co.uk used to support the claim is not directly comparative enough, and that it believes the way Rightmove’s house sales speed data is recorded makes it too vague to be used in such as a direct comparison in an advert.

The ASA therefore says the advertisement was misleading on both counts and must not be repeated.

November 8, 2016

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