YOPA
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Purplebricks is being caught up by rival YOPA says leading investment bank
Purplebricks’ growth is stalling and it’s being caught up by rival YOPA, say analysts at Swiss banking giant UBS It has released a research note that both highlights Purplebricks’ slowing growth and cuts the likely final market share in the UK from 15% to 12%. UBS has subsequently dropped its target price for Purplebricks from £3.05p to £2.85p. Shares in Purplebricks are currently trading at approximately £3.36p each. The bank has also reiterated its advice that investors should sell their shares in the company. As well as flagging up slowing growth for the hybrid agency, the bank says its Subject to Contact market share has been flatlining since September last year at approximately 5%. Raise questions “Given the importance of the Spring Market, we believe that this level of progress will be below management’s expectations, and will raise questions around the potential market share Purplebricks is able to achieve,” it says. UBS also says that one of its key competitors, Savills-backed YOPA, is beginning to catch up Purplebricks and now has 0.5% of the market, and that many hybrid and online agents are now offering ‘no sale, no fee’ options to customers, something Purplebricks does not. “Whilst [YOPA’s market share]…
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Savills says YOPA is now 10th largest estate agent in UK – but by what measure?
Savills has claimed that YOPA, the hybrid estate agency it invested in last year, is now a top ten UK agency. The claim was made yesterday within its preliminary full-year results for 2017 in which it also said its multi-million pound investment into the agency was its largest to date within the tech sector. Savills claimed that YOPA has grown during the past 12 months to become the 10th largest estate agent in the UK, although it didn’t reveal how this was measured. After a long exchange between Savills and The Negotiator, we can reveal that last year Savills believes YOPA was the 10th largest estate agent by new listings, rather than existing listings, branches or employees. Savills has achieved the ‘top ten’ status for YOPA by comparing brands rather than groupings of estate agents such as Countrywide or LSL, whose combined new instructions from all their brands are likely to be considerably higher than YOPA’s. YOPA, which has approximately 100 local agents, also has some way to go before it can claim to be the largest agent by existing listings on Rightmove. It has 3,000 while Savills has over 6,000 and Purplebricks currently lists over 16,000. Newspapers’ cash In…
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ZPG signs up four more big agency brands to multi-year deals, including YOPA
Zoopla parent company ZPG has revealed its latest set of multi-year tie-in agreements with agents including its first with a hybrid operator. ZPG says it has signed ‘long term’ agreements with the agents, which are likely to be similar to ZPG’s recent deals with the larger agency networks and last up to five years. The named companies involved are all South of England and London agents; Foxtons, Dexters and Andrews plus online agency YOPA. The agreements usually offer agents more stable pricing structures in return for committing to advertise all their properties on ZPG’s two main portals, Zoopla and PrimeLocation. Although ZPG won’t reveal the nature of each agreement, they are either simple no-frills listing deals or include elements of services provided by ZPG’s business-to-business brands such as the Property Software Group and Hometrack. 200 branches The latest deals will keep 200 branches within ZPG including the 70 apiece that Foxtons and Dexters each operate, and Andrews’ 60 offices. Yopa doesn’t have any branches but like Purplebricks has local agents who work from home. These number 102 currently, spread across nine regional teams. “We’re delighted to extend our relationships with each of these firms for the long term,” says Mark…
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Online agent YOPA investigated again by advertising watchdog
Online agent YOPA has been investigated by the advertising watchdog just two weeks after being reported for potentially misleading claims on its website. This time the London-based sales and lettings agency was reported by a member of the public for a mailshot sent to them that advertised its sales service but, they claimed, wasn’t clearly marked as marketing material. After being approached by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), YOPA has now promised not to repeat the mailshot and that future advertising of this kind would be clearly marked as such in future. YOPA has been reported five times since it started two years ago including three times this year and once in 2016 and 2015 all of which have been informally resolved, although this hasn’t deterred investors – both Savills and LSL have put substantial amounts of money into the firm. Online agents Among the online agents, Emoov leads the pack for complaints to the ASA with ten referred to the watchdog so far including two serious complaints, one of which was upheld and another upheld in part, and eight informally resolved cases. Not far behind it is Purplebricks, which has had been referred to the ASA nine times including…
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Two high-profile agents investigated by Advertising Standards Authority
Hybrid agency YOPA and London agency Marsh & Parsons have crossed swords with the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) this week after promotional material they had produced were objected to by members of the public. YOPA was reported to the watchdog about a data table published on its website. It featured comparisons of different estate agents including their number of properties for sale and average listing age. Two complainants, who said the comparisons were based on YOPA’s national figures against their competitors’ local one, challenged whether the comparison was misleading “We raised these concerns with the advertiser,” the ASA says. “YOPA confirmed that the ad had been removed and that they would not compare their national data with competitor’s local data.” Advertising Standards Authority A direct mailing by Marsh & Parsons, which is owned by LSL, was referred to the ASA after a letter addressed to a complainant offered to rent out their property because “we couldn’t help but notice that your property is currently on the market for lettings”. “I’d love to meet you and let you know how Marsh & Parsons… can expose your property to the widest range of tenants,” the letter went on. The only trouble was…
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A Question of Property: Russell Quirk, CEO of eMoov
Are online agents like yours really gaining market share? Yes, Rightmove figures show the share of online agents has increased from 2.5% in early 2015 to 6.5% today – that’s an increase of more than 100% in two years. We have data that shows, depending on area, the propensity for people to use an online agent is increasing at a significant rate. I believe it’s all about tipping point. If you talk to business experts, they believe it’s somewhere around 12% market share. We are rapidly moving towards that. Where’s this growth coming from? Look at Countrywide and Foxtons. Their listings and revenues are dropping while the decent online operators such as Purplebricks, Yopa and ourselves are growing our share and numbers in absolute terms in a market that is down by 30%. Some say it’s all fuelled by investors’ cash Yes, it is a question of cash but it’s also about proposition and execution – I think there will be two or three winners in this market. Investors are getting fickler and I know of one online agent which is struggling to raise funding now. But it’s more about that if there are ten competitors in a new market,…
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How much bigger are Purplebricks’ catchment areas than high street agents?
How important is local knowledge to vendors? It’s a question that hybrid agents such as YOPA and Purplebricks are putting under the spotlight right now as they attempt to claim ‘local experts’ with large patches. But research just out suggests that local knowledge really is very important to vendors. So how local is local? Agent comparison site GetAgent looked at national data from 14,000 branches and over a million listings to find out. On average properties listed with traditional sales agents are 3km away from the high street branch they are listed with. But it’s the stark difference in catchment area size that sticks out from the GetAGent research – Purplebricks LPEs operate within an average catchment size of 10km while traditional agents’ areas are no more than 3.8km wide. “Being local is so important,” says Matthew Cousins of Surrey-based Inspire Estate Agents. “I don’t understand how an estate agent can add value if they don’t know the area, the people and the properties. “I know I can value a property accurately in the area I cover as I am likely to have sold a property very close by.” It is also clear that Purplebricks take on twice as many…
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YOPA ditches Village People for surreal testimonial TV ads
Online agent YOPA has launched a new set of TV adverts that replace its previous ‘Village People’ approach, featuring what appear to be customer testimonials of people recommending its services. But instead, the characters featured in the ads turn out to be in bizarre situations that stop them using YOPA. This includes a woman stuck in a boring dream (right), a seaman entombed in ice on his sailing ship (see below), and a man who is only two inches tall and lives in a bean tin. But unlike competitors such as Hatched and Purplebricks, YOPA stays clear of making price comparisons with traditional high street agents, as its previous ads did. The new ads, which include the firm’s recently-launched new logo and colour scheme, instead focus on how YOPA’s ease-of-use, latest technology and a “dedicated local estate agent” make its offering irresistible, as well as its “low, fixed fee”. All the thirty-second long ads sign off with the line “I’d definitely use YOPA to sell my home, but unfortunately….” Followed by a voice-over that says “Seriously, Why Not?”. The campaign will also appear in print and on the radio. The TV ads, which were commissioned by YOPA’s Chief Marketing Officer…
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YOPA raises another £15m
Online hybrid estate agent YOPA has raised a further £15 million from investors including the Daily Mail’s parent company DMGT and Grosvenor Hill Ventures, the investment arm of Savills.
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YOPA claims hybrid agents will handle 50% of sales by 2020
Online hybrid estate agent YOPA has announced that it has raised a further £15 million from investors including the Daily Mail’s parent company DMGT and Grosvenor Hill Ventures, the investment arm of Savills. The company has also made some punchy claims within the statement accompanying the news of its Series B funding, which follows the £16 million investment Savills made in the agency in June last year. This includes that its market share is increasing rapidly and that hybrid agents like it and Purplebricks will handle 50% of all sales by 2020. YOPA, whose founders are Daniel Attia, Andrew Barclay, David Jacobs and Alistair Barclay (pictured LtoR), also claims that the hybrid agency is one of the “country’s top three agents for successful property sale” based on percentages of sales agreed against listing data from Rightmove data. YOPA has a national network of 75 local agents who work exclusively with the company but are freelance not employees, plans to use the new investment to double the number of agents working for it by the end of this year. “After a strong first quarter of trading, we are delighted to have closed our Series B round of funding,” says Daniel Attia, co-founder…
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