Singing Pig

Hi Ducan

 Is that including FS?

Michael

you Guys may wish to have a look at this :

 http://www.redhomes.co.uk/franchise.asp

Our Bracknell branch has sold 150 properties since starting out in March 2006, all from the comfort of their own home.

Even if you don't like the idea of the Franchise when you come to sell your house you might want to save some money. In my area i'm saving my customers an average of £2500-3000.

 If you have any questions please feel free to contact me.

Please note that we are not another 'Internet Agency' , we use Right Move and Local Papers, just like other agents,  but we don't have their overheads so we don't have to charge high fees.
 

Hi Everyone,

I'm sure you can guess with my username that I am a franchisee of CharEstate

My name is Andy and I bought the rights for Swansea. I believe there are only 5 franchisees with CharEstate so far and I am the only home based one. My business is now getting to the point where I need to either open premises or move to an office and employ somebody to deal with the admin work due to it occupying a lot of my time.

I have built up my business slowly over the past 18 months mainly through on-line advertising and referrals. After spending £20k on newspaper and local radio advertising and receiving 5 phone calls from all that advertising I gave up and stuck to on-line work. The property portals are a waste of time too. I have used them all and spent money on them all and not once received a lead. All my leads come from free advertising websites and my own website which I have spent countless hours learning SEO tricks to get me high up the search results.

The whole idea of CharEstate is great and it really works well if you are fully committed. We are nothing like Re-Max or the others. You are also able to run the business how you want and not to a set system although there is one there to help guide you.

I have stayed with the 1% commission ideology and sometimes done set fees less than 1%. The best advice I can give is to focus on property management until you have enough properties under management to give you an income which allows you to re-invest that into building the sales side of the business.

Feel free to contact me if you would like further information.

Hi Folks

i own an estate agents currently, i've also owned a food business and an IT consultancy and i must say i think you would be mental opening an estate agents in this climate! a letting agents is a different matter however (but thats for another thread.) its hard enough for the established folks, i would think a start-up, even one that did knock-down fees and worked with low overheads, would have an extremely tough time establishing any sort of market prescence. Gaining instructions is one thing, selling them is something totally different, and at the moment, precious little is selling in our neck of the woods.

i know from first hand experience because i've spent over 200 grand of my own money over the last two years building the business from zero to where it is today, which is still nowhere near where i want it to be. staff overheads and premises are relatively cheap, but marketing and advertising (online and offline) which vendors take for granted, cost a small fortune.

I dont wish to come across as negative, all power to you if this is the route you want to follow, if you decide to go it alone and want agency agreements, contacts for signs, management spreadsheets or just a voice on the end of the phone PM and i'll happily send you copies of mine you can use gratis.

incidentally, to charestate swansea - out of interest, how do you compete for quality vendor instructions against the likes of dawsons, ashley jones etc, especially when you dont appear to advertise in the evening post or rightmove? I'm asking from a position of experience (i used to own the re/max office in swansea but dont tell anyone ;->)

regards

leighton

So, your after my secrets

I simply do not try to compete or I would end up just being another estate agent. I did try to compete to start with, but found it far too expensive and fruitless.

I just make the most of any leads I get and stay in constant contact with buyers, sellers, landlords and tenants both current and prospective. Simply dropping them regular e-mails or a quick phone call. Its taken time, but word is spreading slowly and I have found everybody really thankful for the service I have supplied. I hopefully come across to them that they are my only client and I am doing everything I can for them.

Initially I contacted most of the agents in an attempt to network, but none of them gave me the time of day. We Will Homes launched at a similar time to me and showed an interest, but they have huge ideas and have gone a little cold on me although the 2 directors seem to be a couple of genuine lads. Benchmark properties as practically become a business partner for me and we share viewings and leads due to geography. I cover East and they cover West although we cover both independently if you know what I mean. Clee have shown quite an interest in me lately due to them not moving into the centre of Swansea, but I assume this is down to them starting up a letting side to their business. I have passed many leads on to other agents and had no thanks for it. I assume they thought I wanted a cut of their commission, but all I wanted was to form some trust between them and myself for various reasons. I don't want other agents slagging me off just to keep clients or to gain new clients. I don't want to be a competition for others and don't want to be involved in the cut-throat image of the business.

My problem is that I gain several tenant and buyer leads a day from my vast internet advertising on free websites. I assume this is because people find me everywhere on-line apart from the major portals. After doing research I've found about 90% of people using the portals are not prospective clients, but people doing research. Even I use them for research and to keep up with what is happening in Swansea. I've also found out from being on websites such as e-mail4property (no longer on there) that the big agents only use portals to advertise their name and do not pick up their leads on a regular basis or if they do, they do not respond to them for a week or so. I usually respond to any lead within 10 minutes maximum usually immediately and I find that gives a great impression. I'm not in this for the money. I am looking to build a business that will give me a comfortable living financially, but not by making money at any given opportunity. It is purely a customer focussed business that will take a long time to succeed, but it will succeed.

The idea is to gain new leads purely from word of mouth. I want people to come to me because they want to not because they have to.

Going back to when I said how many leads I gain. I have 100's of leads looking to buy or rent a property. If I could gain the instructions like the big agents whom look at it purely as numbers, then I would be making a killing. When I do get an instruction I usually have several viewings arranged within a day. The only problems at the moment are the sellers expectations. With regards to tenants and sometimes buyers, if I do not have anything suitable and nothing in the pipeline I will tell them and point them in the right direction which is often to other agents. Hopefully these people go away happy and tell other people that I had nothing for them but helped them free of charge.

It is time consuming working like this, but it gives me great pleasure to help others.

sounds almost identical to the way we work!

in all seriousness, we have the same attitude, we simply cant afford to have the same attitude as the big boys. If you are interested in a relationship with a Neath agent let me know, we'd be happy to share leads / business (i have a good client who is building a house in cwmbwrla you can sell right now - dont want anything in return other than a happy client)

Regards

Leighton 

I would obviously not turn away free business.

I do have a few properties in Neath that I struggle with simply because none of the locals know about me. Besides my franchise agreement does not allow me to advertise in Neath although I can take work on in the area until another franchisee moves in. I doubt that would happen especially in today's climate.

The relationship I have with the Mumbles agent is to simply pass leads each others way. I usually send her plenty of tenants and she sends me some landlords due to her having all the contacts locally. I am from Lancashire and moved here 3 years ago, so have few contacts. We simply help each other build our businesses. Her target was 40 properties under management and she now has them. With them being Mumbles/Gower properties the income is much higher than any I manage, so my target is 50. I still have a way to go due to post properties I have are for let only, but I am getting there. She does not really do sales, but if I ever get leads that may interest her I pass them on. She has now given me all her slaes to market, so they will be on-line this week.

What sales commission do you charge? This client you have, are you marketing the property now?

I've PM'ed you!