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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OnTheMarket targets independent agents as it launches war with ZPG
OnTheMarket has come out fighting five days after its stock market flotation, telling its new City backers that the company is to target independent agents and has already signed up 81, with more in the pipeline. “The estate agent sector is highly local in character and early indications are that we are on track in terms of creating local momentum in the marketplace up and down the UK,” says Ian Springett, CEO of OTM. “The core proposition of the business remains the creation of an agent-backed, full-scale property portal to disrupt what is otherwise a duopoly of Rightmove and Zoopla by offering a premier search experience to consumers whilst charging sustainably fair prices to agents.” But the portal also says it is targeting larger estate agency groups and has already to signed up its first a to five-year deal since launching on the AIM stock market. This is the 18-branch agency Butters John Bee which, as well as signing up to OTM, has withdrawn its listings from ZPG’s portals. The agency, which has branches across Shropshire, Cheshire, Staffordshire and the West Midlands, was bought by the SpicerHaart group in September last year. Butters John Bee is essentially now aligning itself…
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42% of tenants still unhappy about “excessive fees” despite looming ban
Despite the looming fees ban due next year tenants say their number one gripe about renting a property continues to be the “excessive fees” they are charged by agents, it has been claimed. Lettings platform HomeRenter says 42% of the tenants it canvassed recently said they were unhappy about the large fees they had been charged, followed by having to chase agents and landlords about repairs (41%) and paying a security deposit (36%). HomeRenter has also made the surprising claim that 90% of landlords would prefer to rent their homes direct to tenants, and that it’s an arrangement 70% of tenants would prefer too. The surprisingly high figures are within research published today by HomeRenter, contradicting recent data from the National Landlords Association (NLA). It recently said 61% of properties were rented through lettings agents, a figure the NLA said increased last year. But HomeRenter says its research also shows that although 88% of landlords are happy with their rental arrangements, half of all landlords are frustrated by both poor service from their letting agent or poorly-behaved tenants. “There is a clear dissatisfaction from both landlords and tenants towards traditional estate agents,” says Will Handley, CEO of HomeRenter (picture, left).…
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Lomond Capital continues its acquisition trail
Lomond Capital has announced two further agency acquisitions, in Manchester and Brighton.
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Record breakers across the auction market
David Sandeman, Managing Director at Essential Information Group, reports...
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OnTheMarket founding agency Douglas & Gordon signs up with ZPG
Douglas & Gordon, one of the most vocal founding members of OnTheMarket.com, has returned to ZPG on an unspecified but likely five-year deal. The 18-branch agency, which is one of London’s better-known agency brands, has signed up with ZPG after OnTheMarket dropped its one other portal rule ahead of the portal’s recent stock market flotation although it “remains a strong supporter and investor in OnTheMarket and has recently signed a new five-year listing agreement with us,” an OTM spokesperson told The Negotiatotor. Douglas & Gordon continues to list its properties on Rightmove as well, suggesting a new trend in the industry following the OTM share launch; that agents with generous marketing budgets will now choose to list with all three portals. Douglas & Gordon was one of several high profile agents who founded OnTheMarket in 2015 including Savills, Strutt & Parker, Knight Frank, Chestertons and Glentree Estates following two years of behind-the-scenes discussions. James Evans (pictured, left), Douglas & Gordon’s current CEO, says, “We are delighted to be marketing all of our property listings with ZPG again. “ZPG have historically served our business very well and have considerably developed their platform over the past few years in terms of the…
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Christmas crackers at Symonds & Sampson auction
People in search of building plots and renovation projects flocked to The Memorial Hall in Sherborne, Dorset on 8th December for Symonds & Sampson’s final auction of 2017.
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Both Purplebricks and OpenRent change claims made on their websites following ASA investigations
Two of the UK’s largest online agents have been reported to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) about misleading claims on their websites. The first is Purplebricks, its 11th referral since it started up in 2015. A complainant challenged whether the way the company provides information about its standard fee of £849 was misleading. An icon is positioned next to text saying “our standard fee £849” which, when hovered over, pops up with the text: “This is our standard fee for everywhere outside of London and surrounding areas, where we charge £1199 inc VAT. Around 40% of our customers pay us a fixed fee of £300 to cover ALL viewings”. The complainant understood that the average fee was therefore likely to be higher than £849 and challenged whether this was misleading. The ASA says it agreed, saying that “we noted that it was only when a user hovered over the icon that information about the additional cost for the viewing service became visible”. “We approached the advertiser with our concerns and they agreed to amend their website.” Instead, the Purplebricks site now says “viewing service is optional £300” on the main page, rather than as a pop-up. OpenRent complaint The second…
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Rogue estate agent forced to cash in pension to pay back fraud victims
A rogue estate agent has been reduced to living in a caravan and has had to cash in his pension after being returned to court two years after initially being convicted of fraud to pay back the friends and clients he stole money from. Russell Baker, 60, is now thought to have taken £400,000 from people in and around Bovey Tracey (pictured, right) and South Dartmoor in Devon during 2013 to help keep his sales and lettings business, Ashby’s, afloat even though he knew the people he borrowed the money off would not get it back. Baker was a director of three companies which claimed to operate as estate agencies in Devon, all of which have now been dissolved. These are Ashby’s Estate Agents (Devon) Limited, Ashby’s Estate Agents Limited and Baker Lewis Ltd. He had originally told those giving him the money that he wanted to use the cash to buy out a business partner and solve a cashflow bottleneck, but also used classic ‘rob Peter to pay Paul’ tactics to try and keep his business going. This included pocketing one couples’ £22,500 pre-contract deposit for a property purchase, Devon and Somerset Trading Standards Service found during its investigation…
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Hunters acquisition rebrands
Hunters branches in Buntingford, Stevenage and Baldock Lettings opened in Hertfordshire on 1st December...
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Traditional agents just ‘twiddle their thumbs’ in their high street branches, suggests Purplebricks
A video published recently on YouTube by Purplebricks suggests that traditional estate agents just sit and “twiddle their thumbs” in their high street branches. The 30-second video, which has attracted nearly half a million views since it was published both on its own website and on Youtube, features an apathetic woman reclining on a couch who asks whether, if she uses Purplebricks, she will have to “do everything myself?”. The video goes on to make the claim that its Local Property Experts can “manage every aspect of your sales wherever and whenever you need – we think that’s far better than then them twiddling their thumbs in an office on the high street”. Designed to allay consumer fears about using Purplebricks, the video is believed to have been produced by Snap, the same agency that cooked up the company’s ‘commisery’ TV campaign. Three other videos have been filmed for the ‘series’ including ‘how can you charge so little’, ‘why would I sell with someone new’ and ‘why would you get me the best price’. Investor worries The videos have done little to allay City investor worries about Purplebricks. Its share price has yet to recover from the report published recently…
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