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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Leaders and Romans sign up to list all properties with Zoopla
Property Service Holdings (PSH), the parent company of leading estate agency brands Romans and Leaders, is to list all its properties on Zoopla. Until now Leaders, which is the largest independent estate agent in the UK, has listed the properties from its 120 branch network on Rightmove and Zoopla, while Romans’ 28 branches were only listed on Rightmove. But in May last year the two brands were brought together during a merger to create a £120m turnover company with a £35m war chest for further acquisitions. The announcement by the company means both brands will now advertise their combined inventory of some 40,000 sales, lettings, new homes and auction properties on Zoopla Property Group’s websites. The move ends speculation that PSH might have gone with OnTheMarket as its ‘second portal’. Peter Loverdos, COO at PSH (pictured, left) says: “We have been reviewing the property portal landscape for some time and as a result of the substantial marketing and innovative product ideas coming from ZPG, we decided that it is the right time to list all of our branches and properties with ZPG to the ultimate benefit of our customers. “We expect to expand materially over the next few years and need…
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Woods Acquires Palmer & Radclyffe
Woods, the South Devon estate agency group, has expanded with the acquisition of the BoveyTracey estate agency, Palmer & Radclyffe.
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Founding members kick off CIELA club for independent agents
A new membership club exclusively for independent estate agents is to go ahead following a meeting yesterday of 11 founding members, during which they all signed a letter of intent to begin inauguration of CIELA. The aims of CIELA – The Charter For Independent Estate and Letting Agents – are to unite independent agents against corporate domination, unfair practices and the online threat says Charlie Wright, CEO of property software firm Easymatch (pictured, left) and who had the initial idea for CIELA Wright has been extremely critical of online agents such as Purplebricks, and in an open letter to agents recently said they are “undermining the whole industry” and “exploiting vulnerable first-time sellers who are naïve to the challenges and difficulties involved in a successful sale”. Wright started his business life working as a broker on the Liffe trading floor in London before setting up his first businesses for agents; photos and floorplans provider Datography, followed by thebu2iness.com, which has become Easymatch. So far eleven agency businesses owners/managers have been signed up, each to take up a regional chair role within CIELA, with a further two places exclusively reserved for women. The group will meet again on 22nd February to…
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Third Oz city launch today for bullish Purplebricks
Purplebricks has today launched into a third Australian property market and says its business there is expanding faster than its initial launch in the UK in April 2014. Its new Sydney and central coast operation has just gone live with 20 local ‘property experts’ and an AU$5,500 fixed fee which, the company claims, saves sellers AU$15,000 off the cost of using one of the country’s traditional agents. Australia’s property market is a softer target than the UK’s. Agents there typically charge a 2.2% fee plus marketing costs of several thousand dollars,. Purplebricks initialy launched last year into Melbourne and Brisbane, followed by today’s Sydney announcement and later this year, Perth and Adelaide. The company is making much of its success in the UK to promote the Oz operation. Co-founder Michael Bruce (pictured) last week told local paper The Financial Review that the company was “playing a major role in changing the way real estate is sold in the UK and would do the same in Australia”. He also told various media outlets in Sydney recently that the UK’s traditional agents were ‘struggling’ compared to Purplebricks, picking out Countrywide and Foxtons as examples and claiming to be the UK’s largest estate…
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Countrywide results lift stockmarket price
It may be Friday 13th but Countrywide’s Chief Executive, Alison Platt, is probably feeling a little happier as their share price rose this morning following the group’s reported its income for the 12 months to the end of December. Listed as £737 million, it beat their 2015 figure of £734 million and the analysts’ expectations of £702 million. The figure was achieved despite falling volumes in house sales, through their agency offices, particularly in London. Countrywide (CWD.L) said that the volume of sales in London in the final quarter continued to be below 2015’s levels, resulting in a drop of about 6 per cent in the number of deals for the year. However, its lettings business saved the day, supporting sales revenue with strong activity across the country. Countrywide had issued two profit warnings for 2016, saying that it expected full-year market volumes to be 6 per cent lower for the full year. The group said volumes were likely to fall further in 2017. Countrywide is ‘encouraged’ Commenting on the Group’s performance, Alison Platt, CEO said, “It is pleasing to report modest full year revenue growth against the backdrop of a challenging residential sales market. Our Retail and London divisions were impacted by the…
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Foxtons reports profits down by 45% year-on-year
Foxtons has reported a dismal performance during 2016 including total group revenue down by 11% from £150m in 2015 to £133m, and profits for the year likely to be down by 45% year-on-year. Foxtons’ CEO Nic Budden (pictured) also warns that 2017 is likely to be equally painful for the company, saying that “should current levels of sales activity continue in the short term, it is likely that 2017 volumes will be below those in 2016”. The company’s trading statement released today blames the dramatic decreases in turnover and profits on significant drops in sales volumes as the market continues to be “subdued”. Its lettings revenues remained constant during the final three months of the year at £13m compared to the same period the year before, which Foxtons says it down to its “high levels of renewals despite lower levels of new tenant activity and some downward pressure on rents arising from increased stock”. “Despite a challenging year across the residential property markets, we have continued to make good progress in respect of our strategic initiatives, including building our presence in PRS and new homes, and leveraging our technology using data analytics and digital marketing to enhance our customer proposition,”…
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Symonds & Sampson sale
Symonds & Sampson latest auction offerings ensured a packed sale room...
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Campbells seeks ‘extraordinary agents’
Campbells has launched a campaign to teach more people to become extraordinary estate agents across the Midlands.
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43% of auction sales now going to home buyers, claims IamSold
Online auction house IamSold says half of purchasers using its platform are home buyers rather than investors, and that more agents are using auctions in their instruction pitches as online-only, hybrid and proptech companies continue to disrupt their traditional agency models. Data from IamSold reveals that it has seen a 55% uplift in value of homes sold through its auctions while the number of homes sold has increased by a third. This is evidence, the company claims, that both more agents are using auctions and that more upmarket properties are also going under the gavel. “As agents continue to build auctions into their marketing package, we are also starting to see a major shift in public perception,” says Jamie Cooke, MD of IamSold.co.uk (pictured). “Our stats from last year show a significant proportion of consumers turning to auction to buy property for their own use with almost a direct split between cash and mortgaged purchases – 43% of buyers bought for owner occupation while 47% purchased for buy-to-let purposes, and 10% bought to re-sell. “This is very different to a few years ago, when auctions were almost solely the preserve of cash buyers; typically larger investors and portfolio landlords.” These bullish figures…
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Durham letting agent receives MBE in New Year’s Honours List
Richard H Tucker, the managing director of County Durham student lettings and property management firm AAA Property (North East) has been made an MBE in the New Year’s Honours List. His MBE was awarded for services to business, skills and the community in the North East. Richard founded AAA Property Services in 2007 following a career in the Royal Air Force as well as spells working for a supermarket chain and a distribution company. AAA Property, which is based in Newton Aycliffe near Darlington, is unusual because it operates a Caring Caretaker scheme that offers former service personnel work and training within its property management arm. It looks after a wide variety of different properties including buy-to-lets owned by private landlords as well as commercial, healthcare and educational properties within the North East region. “As we have grown, we have found getting good quality handyman has been quite hard,” he recently told the Northern Echo newspaper. “That’s where Caring Caretaker comes in, and we have people here who want to work and want a job. “They are good customer-facing people and what a lot of them don’t want is the repetition some jobs can bring. “They don’t want to be…
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