‘We are at risk of going out of business because of Rightmove’, agent tells The Neg
Independent agents are warning Rightmove and its CEO Johan Svanstrom that fee hikes are driving them to the brink of going bust.
Independent agents warn they will go out of business if Rightmove ploughs ahead with proposed fee increases of up to 18% this year.
In a letter to Rightmove copied to The Neg, Debbie Walley, Director at Winterbrook Estates in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, warns the portal its latest fee hikes put the business at serious risk.
Unjustified and unfair
“Winterbrook Estates has been a loyal customer of Rightmove for many years. During this time, our fees have risen by over 400%, and we have now been informed of an additional 18% increase, which we find entirely unjustified, unsustainable, and unfair.
“We are a small, independent estate agency operating in a small town, competing with over seven other agents. To stay afloat, we have already been forced to cut costs and reduce staffing.
We now face the real risk of going out of business.”
“These decisions are not taken lightly, nor are they due to poor management. They are a direct result of relentless cost inflation caused by Rightmove,” she says.
“We now face the real risk of going out of business, not because of incompetence or mismanagement, but due to unavoidable, inflated portal costs. It is deeply worrying that a well-run independent estate agency could be pushed out solely to protect Rightmove’s profit margins.”
And she adds: “To make matters worse, the recent notification of our price increase was sent via a generic email”.
Petition and legal action
And Shaun Adams, Co-founder of Cooper Adams in West Sussex, who organised a petition against Rightmove fee hikes, said his firm was facing a 12% increase this year.
Adams also set up a website focused on Rightmove’s fees www.portalfeescandal.co.uk.
Some 170 estate agencies contacted a group launched in November that is seeking to initiate legal action against Rightmove. The group is led by former Competition and Market Authority panel member Jeremy Newman.
Rightmove response
A spokesperson for Rightmove says: “As part of our regular membership renewal cycle, we’re having conversations with those agents whose memberships are due for renewal.
“Our focus is on delivering strong value to all of our members, providing agents with the best exposure to our highly engaged home-moving audience, alongside a range of products, tools and insights that help them win more listings, attract buyer and renter interest and secure transactions.
“Agents can choose the package and suite of tools that best fits their business, and our account managers work closely with them to ensure that it aligns with their visibility and growth objectives.”
We have tried year on year to get some sort of small company discount from RM because we cannot afford it. We have rec’d our annual increase notice via email same as always, we know there is no point in challenging. Its take it or leave it and OMG I have so wanted to ditch our sales to leave as I did for lettings 8 years ago. We are only on the basic for sales only and it is crippling us too.
Rightmove will be gone one day, parasitic companies always do.
With the advance of AI, Rightmove will fast become irrelevant in the next few years, they know it and are taking as much cash as they can from us to placate the Shareholders, problem around the corner is Shareholders are aware of the impending crash when agents realise they don’t need to pay for this out of date portal.
The announced progress of programmes such as Anthroptic AI, it’s looking more and more likely this will be here even sooner. A RM share price fall of circa 46% since last August, indicates the markets may have the same beliefs!
Spot on………bring it on.
‘Make staff redundant’ is what one rightmove rep told me when the market was terrible some 20 years ago and i asked for some help to weather the storm …. Nothings changed , they always blame the shareholders who apparently aren’t happy with 80% profitability!,