So it’s now 2006 and boom time. Here we are with a property portfolio valued at £12m and we want to cash out.
We put five fully modernised, clean terraced houses on the market for £280,000 each. According to the estate agent, they were realistically priced to sell fast and aimed at first time buyers. The estate agent came took photos, wrote a description and sent us a two page leaflet and put the properties in the local newspaper. That was it?
Two pages to describe a home with a state of the art kitchen, wooden flooring throughout, original Victorian fireplaces etc? Six months later they sold for £250,000 each.
Our newly renovated town house was, according to the estate agent, realistically priced to sell fast and valued at £900,000. Again, the estate agent came round took photos, wrote a description and sent us a three page leaflet. Two pages to describe a £50,000 kitchen, £30,000 staircase, £40,000 home entertainment room loaded with the latest gadgets. A year later it sold for £825,000.... To the hotel owner next door!!
The old school that was converted into a single home was realistically priced to sell fast and valued at £6m. Again, the estate agent came took photos, wrote a description and sent us a five page leaflet. Two years and no viewings later, we decided to market it ourselves and sold it at full asking price six months later.
The morale of the story is that the description for a home worth £250,000 is only three pages short of being described as a luxury £6m mansion.
It was this sale that had us thinking about the future of estate agency and how we could do it better. The main difference wasn’t a contact list or database. It was done using social media in its early form and in a very haphazard manner compared to today. It was the sole reason we were able to reach potential buyers and sell the home.
Move on nine years estate agents haven’t moved with the times. Pop into an estate agents and ask for property details and you still get two or three pages with six photos or more. Now ask yourself “Is that really how to sell property in the 21st Century?”
What is the future for estate agency in the UK?
We strongly believe that high street agents will either adopt a more pro-active approach to social media marketing or die. We can see a time where UK estate agents will adopt the same tactics as our American counterparts and hit the masses where they hang out. Online in social media platforms.
These New Age estate agents will flourish and consume the dinosaur old boys who are stuck in the Dark Ages. People are becoming savvy to the fact that estate agents need only put a property on Rightmove or Zoopla to get page views. That’s not enough though and vendors want to know what else the agent’s doing. The answer in most cases is nothing.
I recently asked a well known London based estate agent how the marketing of a client’s property was going along. His answer was “Well it’s had 5,500 views this month on Rightmove so it’s popular”. I nearly choked on my coffee. So, 5,500 views and no viewings are acceptable. When pressed to explain what else he was doing to marketing the property, his reply was “Well we’ve emailed it to our database and put it in the papers this week”. In other words, nothing.
As a marketing man, I’m dumbstruck with the way some estate agents handle clients and fob off those that are expecting a quality of service with meaningless stats that shout one thing. We’ve done nothing.
Instead of treating vendors like dumb cattle, why not offer a service that takes a bit of time and effort and maybe, just maybe you’ll reach more potential buyers faster. Rather than asking someone in the office to write the odd Tweet or Facebook status, how about employing someone full time to handle all aspects of social media. Don’t outsource it, do it yourself.
“Why not outsource it?” I hear you ask.
I’ve spoken to dozens of social media marketing businesses and none of them truly understand property and how to sell it. They quote large sums and hide behind the caveat “It’ll take a few months to start working” and estate agency doesn’t work like that. We need results in days, footfall through the door tomorrow not next week. Vendors only understand one thing, offers to purchase and lots of them.
Can you imagine the impact of providing a vendor with a level of service akin to that of a £million home? We’re in the process of starting the ball rolling and in touch with our American counterparts. We love the way they do it and feel the UK market is heading the same way and the by product of that will be higher fees and commissions.
Radical, maybe. Innovative, could be. Different, definitely and the future of estate agency.
