Proptech
News focusing on new technological solutions which create efficiencies and cost-savings for estate and letting agents and the wider residential property industry.
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Proptech firm says its software will reduce transaction times to two days
Properr has won funding to launch Track My Move, a platform which it claims will turn the UK home buying process on its head.
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Rapid referrals for Fine & Country
Fine & Country has launched an upgraded referral system, which features the company’s first app...
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Big win for Helpthemove
Online utility management service Helpthemove was named Best Start-Up 2017 in the Big Chip Awards...
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Will this end the need to chase conveyancing solicitors on the phone?
Estate agents have for decades battled the UK’s frustratingly opaque and slow conveyancing system. But according to a proptech platform due to launch later this month, the days of the ‘black hole’ that property transactions disappear into after an offer has been accepted is about to have a very bright light shone into it. Simon Bath, who two years ago set up a conveyancing legal firm but soon realised the system was “broken”, is about to launch When You Move, an integrated online platform that enables solicitors to keep their introducing agent and broker clients up-to-date with the latest progress on each transaction going through the system. “I’m staggered by the process works at the moment – 80% of a sales progressors’ job is to make phone calls to a solicitor who often doesn’t pick up or returns calls enough,” he says. “The level of frustration grows as all the parties try to find out what’s going on. “But we’ve seen that, by using the technology in our own conveyancing business, if you can automate that comms piece then that problem disappears. And the phone stops ringing off the hook all the time.” “We realised the tech had to be…
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Scoop! Sorbet – the new property management tool for letting agents
Letting agents and property managers have a new way to co-ordinate maintenance reports and inspections, with a ‘refreshing’ software platform called Sorbet.
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Rent should be added to a tenant’s credit history, say landlords
Nearly two thirds of landlords support tenants being allowed to add rental payments to their credit history, according to the Residential Landlords Association (RLA). It canvassed 3,000 of its member landlords of whom 61% said they supported such a move. Following the survey’s result, the RLA says it is writing to the Government calling on it to work with the industry to include rent payment history as a standard feature when calculating credit scores. “With many tenants wanting to buy a house of their own, it is absurd rent payment is not routinely included when undertaking credit checks for mortgage applications,” says RLA Chairman Alan Ward (pictured, left). “Moving to such a scheme would help not just tenants, but also landlords by giving them a clearer sense of whether a prospective tenant has historically paid their rent in full and on time.” The RLA is not the first out of the trap with a campaign. In March this year Jamie Pogson (pictured, below), a young self-employed builder and dad from Plymouth started a parliamentary petition after struggling to get a mortgage after realising he had a poor credit history. His petition took off and amassed 145,000 signatures – enough to…
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Proptech firm launches Facebook style app for apartment blocks
A German proptech company has launched a digital property management platform that claims to be the first in the world to enable property managers and apartment block residents to communicate directly in real time with, and among, each other. It’s a bit like a Facebook group and enables everyone to communicate, chat-style, with each other including the block’s property manager, in real time. Co-founder Bruno Acar (pictured, below) says it’s different from existing property management software tools, which tend to be aimed at agents. He says that instead his platform is designed to be used by the whole community within a block. HomeBeat.Live is an app as well as a desktop platform and residents can use it to talk to each other, as well as tell the building’s property manager about service and maintenance issues. It will also make apartment blocks more social as residents can chat to each other too. “Structurally it’s also a better approach because that way data and platform remain part of the building regardless of any change in service provider,” says Bruno. Other advantages of the platform are that it enables property managers to update all the residents in an apartment block about issues such…
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Interview: the Knight Frank executive who went ‘proptech’
A proptech start-up called OneDome that offers agents the tools to book viewings online has won over £3 million in funding from several backers including Sir Nigel Knowles, the founder of legal firm DLA Piper. The company has also persuaded one of Knight Frank’s senior people to jump ship. Rachel Dipper, who until June was Head of Residential Marketing at Knight Frank, is now heading up OneDome’s promotional effort as Vice President of Marketing and Partnerships. The company also has a former Skype employee leading its technology build and one of its co-founders is former JP Morgan executive, Babek Ismayil (both pictured front row, above). “We offer agents the ability to take on the online disrupters and offer online bookings, without having to partner with another brand,” says Rachel (pictured, left). The company, which has been going about a year and has 12 staff in London and a further 40 in Ukraine, has signed up Essex agent Yaxley Homes to its service and says it has a further 15 agents getting ready to join as well. OneDome offers a platform that enables agents to drive sales and vendor enquiries to their own website, earn referral fees for conveyancing and mortgage enquiries,…
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Virtual Reality property tours launched in Wales
Alexanders reports that it is the first estate agency in Ceredigion/Powys to introduce Virtual Reality Property Tours.
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Humberts launches first dual online and high street lettings service
Humberts has launched the UK’s first switchable online-only and traditional managed lettings service for landlords. The announcement comes five months after the company said it would be relaunching its lettings operation headed up by high-profile industry executive Suzanne Diamond (pictured, below). The new online offering is called Humberts Lettings Direct and will charge landlords £199 plus VAT for advertising on Rightmove and OTM as well as deposit and first-month rent collection, referencing, contract management and legal protection insurance. Humberts says the £199 will then be deducted from any fees charged should a landlord then switch to the traditional approach. But rather than the company build its own technology, 175-year-old Humberts is partnering with proptech start-up Propoly. Propoly started up three years ago as Nanoget before changing name and joining angel investment firm Pi Labs, initially presenting itself as an alternative to lettings agents for landlords and tenants. The company’s board includes non-executive director Margaret Longden (pictured, right), who is Countrywide’s Retail Programme Director and who, from 2010 onwards, helped expand the PLC’s lettings business. Also, Countrywide holds 366,034 Series A shares in Propoly. White label technology Humberts is using a white-labelled version of Propoly’s technology, which is essentially a messaging platform…
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