Estate agent challenges Rightmove over property ‘misdescription’
Estate agent Daniel Davie says a cloakroom toilet cannot be counted as a bathroom, and wants the portal to agree.
When is a bathroom not a bathroom on Rightmove? That is the question posed by Bedfordshire agent Daniel Davie (inset, main pic).
Davie, who is a partner in Inskip & Davie based in Sandy, has challenged Rightmove to accept that a cloakroom cannot be counted as a bathroom.
He says it is misleading to list the downstairs WC as one of the bathrooms in a house description.
Amazement
Agents use a dropdown box to add the correct figure, however, there now seems to be a difference in opinion on what represents a bathroom, as the number can vary, he says.
“I have used Rightmove since its formation, and pride myself on describing property correctly at all costs, never knowingly mis-describing each.
“I have asked Rightmove to clarify the correct amount [of bathrooms], and to my amazement they too chose three [family bathroom, ensuite and cloakroom].”
Good faith
“My own belief and professional training have always shown me that when advertising a property, you should do so keeping in mind that a potential buyer could be travelling a great distance to view in good faith of the full description,” he says.
“Number of bedrooms, off road parking, garden size, etc are always crucial. At the same token, a family could place importance against the number of bathrooms a property offered.
I would feel aggrieved and somewhat misled.”
“I gave an example to Rightmove, that if I were driving and saw a service station sign with a plate, knife, and fork symbol, which motivated me to stop to eat, only to find a vending machine of chocolate, I would feel aggrieved and somewhat misled.
Davie says has left the issue with Rightmove, “reminding them that we need a level playing field”, they say they will pass it onto the relative team.
The Neg has approached Rightmove for comment.
I totally agree with this. I’ve never listed a cloakroom/wc as a bathroom, for the simple reason …. it doesn’t have a bath. Rightmove need to sort this.
I agree that it is slightly misleading – and should be corrected – but I’d say that as long as the full description copy and the floorplan clarified this then it shouldn’t be an issue.
Surely it’s reasonable to expect a potential viewer to read the full description copy and look at the floorplan before deciding to book a viewing?
Assuming the agent uses everything at their disposal in the listing there should be a lot more information available to allow the potential viewer to make a fully informed decision than on a service station sign designed to be viewed at 70mph…
See where you are coming from and I tend to agree, playing devils advocate some people use the expression “ just need to use the bathroom” when using the separate WC however, common sense should prevail and a bathroom is just that, A BATHROOM
In my view a bathroom contains a bath or a shower. It’s in the name – a room to bathe. The Rightmove usage would mean that a 1930s or 1950s terraced houses with a bathroom and separate wc (very common back in the day) could have 2 bathrooms in an advert. I’m sure a judge, tribunal or the Advertising Standards Authority would take the same view.
In America agents advertise separate toilets as a half bathroom but even that would be a bit misleading here..
I totally agree Daniel. I too pride myself on correct description of properties and in my book a cloakroom is not a bathroom.