Agencies & People
News covering the businesses, activities, people and personalities in estate agency and letting agency and wider residential property industry.
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Unusual marketing tactic? Agent runs competition to rename development
“I name this building…” Normally it is an honour bestowed upon royalty and celebrities, but this could be your chance of fame. Norwich estate agent, abbotFox is about to launch a competition in which the winner will choose the name of a new apartment building in the centre of the city. This once in a lifetime opportunity is the consequence of abbotFox gaining permission to be able to re-name Elliot House on Ber Street, which is currently being converted into 45 luxury apartments. The competition will run until the 24th March when the winner will be announced. abbotFox would like to receive as many ideas and suggestions as possible, from famous people in the area, to your favourite things and anything else you can think up – the quirkier and more unique, the better. Two answers will be picked and then the public will cast the final vote on what the building will be named. BE PART OF THE LANDSCAPE Entering the competition will give participants the rare prospect of becoming part of the Norwich property landscape. In a years’ time, if you know somebody who is moving to Norwich, you will be able to drive past and tell them that you…
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In pictures: the well that led to a £200,000 fine for Wiltshire agent
This is the well that a 39-year-old woman fell down last April while taking part in an open house event at a property in Malmesbury, Wiltshire. The agent which conducted the viewing, Strakers, was fined £200,000 last week by Swindon Magistrates Court after the woman, Lucy Driver, stepped onto a wooden board covering the well, which then gave way. During the case, which was brought by the Health and Safety Executive, the court heard that the agent, which has a branch in the town, had been warned about the well being unsafe during a previous viewing. Strakers’ managing director Anthony Bulley told the BBC that directors and staff had been ‘deeply distressed’ by the incident, and that the company had “carried out extensive internal investigations and have fully cooperated with the Health and Safety Executive throughout culminating in a plea of guilty at the earliest opportunity presented,” he said. Mrs Driver had to be rescued by firemen after falling 30 feet down the well and suffering head injuries, ‘whole body whiplash’ and later Post-traumatic Stress Disorder after spending more than an hour at the bottom of the well in water while awaiting rescue. During the incident, a neighbour used a…
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Who? Eric Eckardt to lead Purplebricks’ US operation
The newly-installed CEO of the Purplebricks’ USA operation is Eric Eckardt (pictured), a 42-year-old serial property tech start-up entrepreneur and keen skier with a background in investment banking. Educated in New York, he then joined the banking industry where he spent nine years working for three different banks including JP Morgan, Bank of Tokyo and ABN AMRO, before setting up his own company Eckhardt Holdings LLC. He used that as a vehicle to launch several start-ups including a private mortgage company and an online brokerage firm called ZonicRealty which he launched in 2012 with his brother. It prompted a lot of media coverage in the US, but in June 2016 morphed into Dwellowner.com. Like its predecessor, the company is a flat-fee brokerage rather than charging agents a percentage-based commission. At the same time Eric Eckardt was steering another business, Luxembourg-based Hubzu.com where he was a vice-president working direct with US brokers. Hubzu specialises in selling bank-owned properties but hired Eckardt to help move the company into the US real estate market. He left in 2015 and returned to the US to focus on his DwellExchange business, which he describes as a full-service hybrid real estate brokerage – something that no…
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Michael Bruce raises £50 million from City for Purplebricks USA
Hybrid agent Purplebricks has raised funds through a share issue to help the company break into the US market and launch Purplebricks USA. The funding move raised £50 million pounds via AIM by offering shares at £2.20 each, just under its current share price of £2.26p, which rose by 2.1% during late trading yesterday. The placing was over subscribed and raised several million more than Purplebricks had sought. The company says the cash will be used to set up operations in several key US states during the second half of 2017, and estimates the potential commission cake in the US is approximately $70 billion or £56 billion. The move into America follows Purplebricks’ entry into the Australian market in August last year in Melbourne and Brisbane, which by October it had deemed to be a “great success”. The company currently has 437 properties for sale on its Australian website, up from less than a 100 in October. But unlike in Australia, where the estate agency business is very similar to the UK one, in the US properties are sold in a way that could suit the Purplebricks model as many realtors there are self-employed. “We are confident that with our understanding…
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Another senior Countrywide veteran exits business
The brain drain out of Countrywide continues apace after Nick Dunning Associates announced it has appointed Julian Irby as chief financial officer and a main board director. Other senior former Countrywide staff at Nick Dunning Associates include Graham Harrison (former MD of lettings) and Matt Hewitt (former chief marketing officer) as well as Nick Dunning. Irby will start in April and arrives from Countrywide following a 16-year career at the company where he held several roles including as finance director of its lettings division and, most recently, national sales and lettings finance director. It is not a surprise that Irby has moved over; he worked with Nick Dunning at Countrywide and like Dunning has wide experience of acquiring and merging businesses. Nick set up his company in November last year after a seven-year stint at Countrywide and since leaving, has embarked upon a programme of acquisitions with the aim of creating a fourth large corporate in the property sector, and says he intends to buy 20 mainly lettings businesses a year for the next five years. Most recently, it bought up Badger Holdings, parent company of the 26-branch Townends and Regents network. “I am extremely excited to be joining Nick Dunning…
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Gender pay gap widens as property pay rises
Salaries for UK property professionals remained robust in 2017, according to the latest survey by RICS and Macdonald & Company, but the gender pay gap has increased from last year. The key findings were: • Male property professionals earn on average £11000 more than female counterparts (£7000 in 2016) • Sector salary pay rises up 7.2% overall- above UK wage inflation* • Average salaries down, but largely explained by changing demographics of the survey Male property professionals earn, on average, £11,113 more than their female colleagues (£54,931 versus £43,818). The gap is evident across the majority of age groups and is greatest for those aged between 46-55, where the difference in average salary is 25.7%. Encouragingly, the gender pay gap is now less evident in those starting out in property with females earning slightly more than males – which is a turnaround from last year where the pay gap was most evident in 18-22 year olds. The survey is also still indicating the attraction of property as a career. Of those who received a pay rise in 2017 in the industry the average increase was 7.7% (up from 7.1% in 2016). This is far above UK wage inflation which sits at 2.7%*. Considering the…
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Suffolk Negotiator Awards winner branches out
After their recent success winning ‘New Agency of the Year’ at The Negotiator Awards, Best Estates has opened their third office in Sudbury.
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Land and New Homes Network Grows
A fast growing network which brings estate agents and house builders together has moved into new offices with a long term plan to turn them into a hub for high calibre businesses related to the property industry.
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Fenn Wright Acquires Thorntons
Independently owned East Anglian estate agency Fenn Wright has acquired the respected, Sudbury based, Thorntons for an undisclosed fee.
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Purplebricks Australia ‘growing’
Michael Bruce, CEO, Purplebricks, says that its launch into Australia has had a fantastic start.
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