Foxtons agent goes ballistic ???

Don't know if it's true, maybe the guy had a meltdown or something ...








The original comment is missing, but R&M has the screenshot

Battle for the best investment agent

Property Week's campaign to find the UK's best investment deal broker is coming to a close. Voting closes this week. So far Savills and LSH are in the lead

Florida agent gets the sack for blog posting sexy video

Coming from the land of Page 3, the video is actually quite tame. In London I see way more T&A daily in a bunch of different tabloid newspapers and often pay very little attention; but in Florida, things seem to be a whole lot different.
Shaun McLane, an Orlando based agent and blogger posted a video and blogged about using sex to sell real estate. The New York Times wrote about this; Curbed had a competition to find the sexiest agent, and we even did our part (but got overwhelmed with responses). So the point is, Shaun (who has left us many comments in the past) posts the controversial video and asks the hypothetical question does sex sell real estate. The honest answer is yes it does, sex sells everything, but it doesn't have to be pornographic.
The problem with me watching Shaun's video is that it showed a lot of T&A (which I enjoyed watching), but it didn't show a lot of houses. If I came across the video elsewhere, to be truthful, I probably wouldn't make the connection between the sexy women shown in the video and the houses Shaun was trying to sell, which would be the whole point of making the video. If I had seen the women in the houses, or if Shaun was attempting to attract me to a certain lifestyle, it would probably have made a difference. My memories of Florida (I've been to Miami, but I've never visited Orlando) is women, beaches, bikinis and a fabulous nightlife. My first impression of Shaun's video reminded me of a Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue or of a calender that I would see in a construction office. The point is it wasn't sexy enough to sell me real estate, but it was controversial enough to get Shaun fired from his job as an agent with an undisclosed brokerage in Orlando.
From Shaun's most recent blog post:

The video has been making its rounds, and I decided to share it with a few of most closest friends in my office. One of them decided to forward it to our team leader, who then forwarded it to my broker. I received a call from the team leader saying she wasn't happy with the video. She said she didn't really know what to say, and that the video looked very professional, and the music was "nice," but she didn't think it was acceptable. Later last night, I missed a call from my broker, and she left a less-than-nice voicemail disapproving of the video.
Fast forward to about 30 minutes ago. My phone rings, and it's my broker. She stresses how unhappy with this video she is. She admits that she, and the others in the office got a good laugh from it, but she did NOT want the video associated with her office. Well, if you watch the video, it makes no mention of her office, but she said that wasn't good enough.
Twenty minutes later, I get an ultimatum: "Take the video down, or I'll have to let you go."
The video is still up, and I no longer work for this broker.

Jay Thompson, The Phoenix Real Estate Guy commented on Shaun's situation, stating that:

the broker has legal obligations and liabilities that a lot of agents seem to forget. The "I'm an independent contractor" argument isn't valid in *many* of the places agents tend to use it.

Describing the video as 'out the box' Jay offered further commentary on Sellsius:

just because someone is an independent contractor does not give them carte blanche to do whatever they want, particularly when it comes to advertising (which ostensibly is what the video was). At least in Arizona (and maybe different in Florida), the designated broker has to approve all advertising. They are liable for it, so they have the right to approve/deny it. It’s the broker’s ass in a sling, not the agents, if anything goes awry with state or fed regs.
Would I have fired Shaun? I don’t know. I would have had aand long chat, with a mutual exchange and discussion — listening to his side and explaining mine. Maybe I’m way out there, but I think we could have come to an agreement where both of us were happy.

In a related comment on Future, Shaun agrees that his video could have been "less blatant," but that it was meant to be "over-the-top." Nevertheless, Shaun's argument is that the whole thing could have been avoided if he had been approached differently. Shaun intends to open his own brokerage in a few weeks and we wish him best of luck. If you're ever in Orlando and feel like buying some property, why not stop by Shaun's office. All round, he seems like a pretty decent guy, somebody I'd probably do business with.

Help catch blogstalker Felicity J Lowde

This story is weird.
Social blogger Rachel from North London (pictured) is the victim of blogstalker Felicity J Lowde.
Lowde was found guilty of harassment recently, but is on the run and blogging a strange rant/defense over here.
Rachel is a heroic 7/7 bomb survivor, and set up her blog to help other victims of the tragedy, yet Felicity J Lowde has the audacity to accuse her of "deserting the dead".
The story gets weirder as one of the most popular estate agents in London almost goes by the same name as the apparent Ms Lowde(Felicity J. Lord),
which leaves me wondering that perhaps the reason the police can't catch up with Ms. Lowde is because she's using a pseudonym. Nevertheless, can all this negative publicity be good for Felicity J Lord?


UPDATE: May 25, 2007; Lowde captured and in custody

Foxtons new mini

Just in time for summer

Barbara Corcoran interview

Learn how to turn $1,000 into $66 million from Barbara Corcoran, the queen of New York City real estate. In this 5 minute interview, Barbara explains her companies early internet adoption (way back in 1990) and that the "power" has "moved to the consumer", which is actually not so bad for business, because - according to Corcoran, the more information the consumer has, the more business that's done ...
update ...
here's part 2 and part 3

The problem with Foxtons marketing

Foxtons have been doing some aggressive (and technically impressive) guerrilla marketing lately. However I wonder about their overall strategy, and a lot seems to be timed with their well publicized IPO intentions or in an effort to score a private equity buyout.
Looking at the Foxtons video advert, reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend recently who reminded me that you hardly ever see anybody over 30 working at Foxtons; which is great for sex appeal, but not so good when trying to sell property in London. In essence, Foxtons appear to be trying to appeal to a younger, more tech savvy demographic, but the problem is that most young tech savvy people in London can't afford or don't buy property in London. And the few that can and do, well why would they use Foxtons, given their less than stellar reputation.

I'm going to assume that the company makes the bulk of their revenue from lettings. I'm basing this on the fact that they're so obviously appealing to young people, and young London may not buy, but they sure do rent.
This poses another problem since a lot of landlords - especially those that have significant portfolios - are dubious about doing business with the big F(u), a company that has been known to and caught on camera forging landlords signatures. Nevertheless, the company has been making strides to clean up their act, and joining the Ombudsman Scheme for Estate Agents was definitely a big step, although they're not yet members of the more influential and credit worthy National Association of Estate Agents.

Officebroker.com brokers £3 million deal with Regus

Online office space broker Officebroker.com is celebrating after Sales Manager Dan Murphy brokered a £3m deal for FTSE traded Regus - the UK’s leading supplier of outsourced workplaces. The £3m contract, has been named the single biggest transaction secured by Regus in the second half of 2006, and was recognised at the Regus awards ceremony which took place in London last week.
Dan, who works at Officebroker.com’s Staffordshire office, picked up the award for the contract between Regus and a communications business that took just under 10,000 square feet of space at a Regus’ business centres in Bracknell.
Officebroker.com was also named ‘Brokerage of the Year 2006’ at the ceremony reflecting the company’s phenomenal growth since launching five years ago.

BrightSale's MD defines what it means to be 2.0

Last week, we posted a write-up on Brightsale.co.uk, a "2.0" start-up. While impressed with the business model, we were a little unsure as to whether they were serious about what they were doing or just riding the current 2.0 hype. Well Brightsale's MD Andy Etches caught wind of our post and emailed us with his definition of a 2.0 value system and why he felt Brightsale fit the bill. Here's a portion of his email:

We believe we embrace all of the values that the 2.0 school of thought stands for. We are open, honest, community focussed and user driven. We are hoping to streamline the process of buying and selling houses here in the UK using new technology and some very well thought out processes.
Over the next few weeks we will be releasing some new features which will give our customers more power than any before. I'd like to take a minute to give you an exclusive sneak peak at some of the things we have in development.
The messaging centre
For the first time, buyers and sellers will be able to communicate directly through our messaging system. Whereas many estate agents here in the UK keep their customers as far apart as possible for fear of being bypassed. Our customers will be able to securely talk with their buyer or seller, giving a level of transparency that has never before been possible. BrightSale.co.uk will allow the members of the community to use technology to talk without boundaries.
Search cloud
We will be launching a search cloud, which will show at a glance the most popular towns and counties that our users are looking for property in.
The viewings calendar
Our sellers will be able to set specific timeslots when their property will be available to view. If a buyer decides they want to view that property they will be able to select one of these timeslots and it will immediately be allocated to that buyer. Sellers and buyers will immediately be notified of the viewing by email, all parties will be sent a reminder email 5 hours before the viewing is scheduled. Your calendars can be synced with iCal and Outlook for convenience. We believe this is a great tool which takes much of the pain out of viewing property. No more will people have to go back and forth to estate agents on the phone and jump through hoops just to view a property.
Maps
I note this, specifically as you mentioned it. We are working on a couple of map projects, one really exciting (but staying under wraps for the moment) and the others just great. We will be of course integrating a map of every property on every page, showing the satellite view and road map. The ability to search the sites properties via a map is also a feature under development. Our main feature ties everything together and is unique to the UK, it is designed, again to empower the users with information whilst at the same time increasing the chances of everyone achieving a sale. Once this feature goes live, I'll be sure to let you know.
I hope you found this email interesting. I'm sure now you will see we are not simply using the "2.0" phrase as a buzzword to jump on a bandwagon. We really are hoping to bring all of the good qualities of the next generation of the internet to the UK property market.

Pretty innovative stuff, but do they have what it takes to bridge next generation internet to the property market? Will the industry support, vilify or attempt to destroy? Will the general public take notice or even care?
Post your comments; we're eager for your thoughts ...

Introducing BrightSale.co.uk - Estate Agency 2.0

I remember the first time a geek friend of mine introduced me to Business 2.0, the influential magazine, shortly after launching, I guess maybe 5 or 6 years ago. I remember getting really excited, read a few issues and shortly after, my excitement faded I went back to reading FT and WSJ for business news. Now today the term "2.0" is all over the place. Of course Web 2.0 is the daddy but there's other terms such as "Real Estate 2.0" (apparently trademarked by Redfin; who unceremoniously shut down a blogger last year for using the term); Technology 2.0 and there's even websites claiming to be "Sex 2.0".
So it comes as no surprise that a new property website has quickly coined the phrase "Estate Agency 2.0". Truthfully, the only thing "2.0" about Brightsale.co.uk is the RSS feed; surprisingly the service has no map integration which has become standard in all 2.0 property websites. Nevertheless, in true geek style, Brightsale is offering a version of their site for the Nintendo Wii users (http://wii.brightsale.co.uk).
Exciting stuff, but how long the excitement will last.

Rat and Mouse announces Register of Estate Agents

London's number one property blog announced today the brand new Register of Estate Agents (ROEA), a service aimed at helping separate "the pros from the, er, cons in UK estate agency." Apparently, the ROEA differs from existing National (and very unresponsive) Association of Estate Agents (NAEA)as well as the as yet unproven Ombudsmen scheme; in that it permits direct feedback from the general public and already has an impressive 7,000 agents registered, compared with 10,000 advertised NAEA members; a company which has been around for 40 years. Clearly the ROEA has tapped into something that the agents are loving.
But it ain't cheap; it currently costs"£1 a day" at the ROEA; (agents have the added benefit of registering for "a day, week or up to a year"), versus £1-200/year to be an NAEA member.

KFH signs deal with Rightmove and Primelocation

London based Kinleigh Folkard & Hayward announced today that they have finally signed up with Primelocation and Rightmove. Beginning this month the company will list from 50 branches in London; "60 per cent of our buyers and 50 per cent of our tenants will look at a property portal before any other activity when looking for a new home and overall, 83 per cent of our buyers use a portal as part of their search. We have taken a very measured approach to online marketing and through our analysis it is an undeniably powerful tool in today's market place," claims Paul Masters, KFH Marketing Director.

Aliens first landed in Paddington!

That's right and it's all part of a sinister Government coverup according to Springfields Lettings. The agency is marketing a one bed flat, rumored to be the site where man first made contact with alien life back in the 50's. Call them on 0207 706 3355 to arrange a viewing (not of the alien unfortunately). By the way, the flat also has a dishwasher ... handy

[via RatandMouse]

Estate Agents, the Internet and the KKK (Freakonomics 101)

According to Freakonomics, the Klu Klux Klan was a power group much like estate agents; deriving its power in large part from the fact that it hoarded information. Once that information falls into the wrong hands (or, depending on your point of view the right hands), much of the groups advantage then disappears.
Nestoria's "large database of property listings" led them to take a look at how estate agents describe their properties and according to Ed; "we can't find a single bad property!"


Back to Freakonomics:

On page 68 of the bestselling book, the writers proclaim information as "the currency of the Internet." According to Levitt, the net is "brilliantly efficient at shifting information from the hands of those who have it into the hands of those who do not. Often ... the information existed, but in a woefully scattered way [but the internet] has vastly shrunk the gap between the experts and the public."
Levitt cites a study of estate agents in the US revealing how agents attempt to convey information in the for sale ads they write:

A phrase like "well maintained," for instance means that a house is old but not quite falling down. A savvy buyer will know this (or find out for himself once he sees the house), but to the sixty-five year old retiree who is selling the house, "well maintained" might sound like a compliment, which is just what the agent intends.
An analysis of the language used in real-estate ads shows that certain words are powerfully correlated with the final sale price of a house. This doesn't necessarily mean that labeling a house "well maintained" causes it to sell for less than an equivalent house. It does however indicate that when an agent labels a house "well maintained", she is subtly encouraging the buyer to bid low.

Levitt claims that if the ad words for a estate agents own home are analyzed, the agent places an emphasis on descriptive terms ("new," "granite," "maple," "move-in condition," ) and avoids empty adjectives (including "wonderful," "immaculate," "well-maintained").

Ed's fascinating observations about UK property descriptions include:

* Properties are more than twice as likely to be "spacious" as they are to be "massive".
* There are more "excellent" properties then there are "stunning" properties
* Fewer properties "boast" features than "benefit" from features

(Ed also revealed that he spent the last year in a bedroom where he could "touch all four walls," and although he's about 6'3 - 6'4, it still came as a shock to him that there were so many 'spacious' properties available. Who knows, maybe he should have got a better agent, and of course because Nestoria wasn't around back then we'll have to give him a pass.)

What's fascinating is the cryptic rise of internet power and the democratic shift of power in the real estate world. Witness for example the popularity and influence of London's Rat and Mouse weblog; started by a self-confessed "property porn addict" (there's so many), a guy who - it appears - really had no professional background in real estate.
Ed, Ivalio and others readily admit that the drive for them to start writing search scripts came from the individual frustration and to some degree desperation they experienced while searching for a home here in London.
Right now, the UK property market is hot and overheating; but for the most part, estate agents and property professionals are happy, well fed, and quite nonchalant. Most are acting like it's going to stay like this forever. Wake up call - it's not.
This too shall pass is what the wise say to themselves.
Witness the so-called "bubble" in the US and the way agents in that part of the world are (to a degree reluctantly) embracing the internet information power shift. If you can't beat 'em; join 'em seems to be the ethos amongst US property professionals. They kicked up a storm when Zillow and Redfin entered the marketplace and - overnight - radically shifted the way people searched for property. But a few months later, they defend them.
The same hasn't happened over here, because things are good.
Nestoria, Rat and Mouse and others are encroaching the UK market at a time when nobody in professional property is really paying too much attention to them. These services are viewed by most property professionals as novelties. But there is no doubt that these services are radically shifting the way people in the UK search for property. And there's no doubt that - as the bubble begins to burst - property people will begin to pay closer attention.

Foxtons launches dropin tool

Following Nestoria's example, London's estate agent has just launched a third-party development tool enabling webmasters to display content on their website.

From the Foxtons blog:

Webmasters can choose between sales, lettings and short lets properties and also by region. It is also possible to display the properties as a text list, with thumbnail images or even just large colour photographs for maximum impact.

No word yet on any revenue sharing possibilities.

Knight Frank planning £600m European property IPO

Knight Frank, is planning a £600m European property IPO. The move comes amid a surge of new investment on the continent by an array of international investors, notably from the US and the UK. Investors are drawn by commercial property yields of 6 per cent or higher. In Britain and North America this margin no longer exists for many grade-A properties.

Foxtons opens new Islington office

London's most controversial agency announces the opening of its brand new Islington office at 355-357 Upper Street; beside Angel Tube station. The new office, accommodating 120 staff in a "café-style design" environment; is no doubt part of CEO Jon Hunt's "sale and leaseback" strategy in his efforts to break the US market.
Foxtons' money loosing presence in the New York metropolitan area began five years ago with a £12m investment in New Jersey, later expanding to Manhattan and eventually Connecticut. The Times reports that Hunt expects to loose £6m this year while absorbing a £32m investment from his New York operations.
Foxtons' controversial “beware of sharks charging 6%” advertising campaign hasn't gone down too well in America; where agents average 6% commissions per sale, versus the 2% that they're charging. Not only have the New York agents rebelled, but Hunt admits that it's not easy to convince the general public that there is no catch. Plus the rise of flat fee services like Redfin is causing great upheaval in the way the real estate game is played in the US and will no doubt greatly affect Hunt's ambitious American business model.
Nonetheless, with a UK pre-tax profit of £25m on sales of £90m, whatever short term losses Hunt experiences stateside can be easily offset by the profits he's making over here. The bigger question is long term sustainability of his American business model.
Foxtons expects to raise more than £14m through its ongoing sale and leaseback strategy of many of its London offices. They're also planning to expand operations outside London and into the rapidly growing Home Counties market, with new offices costing about £1m each to open.

Countrywide sold!

From the Telegraph: Countrywide has accepted an indicative take-over offer of around £900 million from private equity company 3i
UPDATE
Rightmove refuses to respond to "newspaper speculation";
details emerging

OneMove rocks the boat

RatandMouse has the scoop:
OneMove a new on-line property service which claims to be "the single largest residential property portal in England and Wales." They're also claiming a database of all properties advertised on each of the major property portals, including Rightmove, Look4aProperty, Primelocation, fish4homes, FindaProperty, propertyfinder.com and thinkproperty.com, as well as the properties on offer from many of the UK's leading estate agents, including Foxtons and the PropertyPro network.
R&M comments:

Right now, though, I'm a little concerned about their search claims. When I search Nestoria for 4 bedroom houses up to £600,000 in W6, I get this:

OneMove offers this:

Elsewhere, similar results. Perhaps the press release got a bit ahead of the database.

Notwithstanding, they do have an intriguing business model, offering consumers a free "Personal Moving Consultant (PMC) who will take care of everything from finding a solicitor through to organising the utilities." and providing transaction updates via e-mail, mobile, or BlackBerry. But as R&M points out, there isn't an estate agent in the land who won't very gladly "lead you into the safe arms of a lender, lawyer or financial advisor." OneMove's approach is a little different and it appears however that their business model is geared towards making money by providing add on services. and recommendations. The press release is also claiming a relationship with over 250 law firms to provide conveyancing services; a panel of "Financial Advisors" , offering mortgage, tax planning and insurance services; as well as a removal service and a "utility package".
Sounding great on paper; let's see what happens when they put it into practice

Estate agency call centers ... the future?

Close but not quite according to Zillow co-founder Lloyd Frink, speaking to California Realtors this week. Frink vows that Zillow won't do to estate agents what Expedia.com (his old website) did to travel agents. In fact - according to Frink - the oft-repeated nuance that Expedia killed the travel agent industry is incorrect. Frink claims that most of them now have a bright future working call centers! Which begs the question is this the future for estate agents?
Imagine Canary Wharf for sale or rent ... via Mumbai; may not be that far off as you think!
[via Real Estate Voices]
[related: Zillow Gets Pillowed In Old School Smackdown]