Panic in the Air?

We were slightly surprised to receive an email last week from a traditional estate agent who was contacting everyone on the Fish4Homes network to urge them to protest against the new Tesco property market. As any reader of this blog will know, we don't believe that Tesco will get any further than Asda did with a pure sell it yourself model. People will initially be impressed that they can list a property for £200 (despite the fact that there are numerous sites like www.listaproperty.com where you can get all the same benefits for free). But when the enormity of actually trying to organise a sale with no help dawns on people we are sure of two things: 1) completion rates will be paltry and 2) people will flock to hybrid sites like BrightSale.

But it really was the despair in the tone of the email from the traditional agent that caught our attention. It was the first time we had really seen an admission of fear (even panic) and it certainly does suggest that traditional high cost / high fee agents are really now starting to wonder whether they are now in the same place travel agents were in 1997.

Quite what they are going to do about it will be fascinating to see, but if this email (and history) tells us anything, it is that we will hear a lot about 'unfair competition' and the 'need for regulation', and precious little about what they themselves could do to lower their own costs and improve their service for customers.

Tesco Announcement

You are probably aware of Tesco’s entry into the ‘sell it yourself’ property market this week.

This morning the portal Fish4Homes joined Findaproperty.com and PrimeLocation.com in abandoning Tesco’s venture. We believe that Tesco’s ‘sell it yourself’ model is fundamentally flawed and so we have decided that no BrightSale properties will appear on their website. We will, of course, continue to market BrightSale properties to genuine portals such as: RightMove, PrimeLocation, Fish4Homes, Findaproperty, Propertyfinder Zoomf and many others. And BrightSale’s own buyer database continues to grow at a dramatic pace.

At BrightSale, we believe passionately in our ‘hybrid’ online estate agency model, whereby we offer a low fee (0.5%) and sophisticated online tools, but back them with a team of experience property negotiators to ensure that you are not alone in the complex process of selling your home. Tesco’s venture is merely a listings service, with no estate agency support – and so we have no option but to dissociate ourselves from it. 

We continue to believe that the future is BrightSale, and we hope to be of service to you in the very near future.

The iPhone - How do we look?

Not strictly related to online estate agency I know. But I would love to hear from anyone in the US who has an iPhone.

We want to ensure that BrightSale looks it's very best on every platform and considering this iPhone looks like it might be quite a hit we want to make sure that our site is 100% ready for the October UK release. 

Got an iPhone?  Let us know!

Not sure what the fuss is about?  Have a read of what seems to be the fairest review I've read so far by our friends at Nextlust gadget blog.

Tesco Misses the Mark

The entry of Tesco into the UK online estate agency market has long been rumoured (the BBC first reported the story in May 2005). But what Tesco has produced is more damp squib than 800 pound gorilla.

As it happens, BrightSale shares many of the goals of Tescos’ new venture: much better value for money combined with sophisticated online tools to assist sellers. But Tesco’s model is fundamentally flawed in that sellers will not have a single point person to help them through the maze of negotiations, viewing bookings, solicitors, chains, HIPs and the myriad of other issues facing sellers in our convoluted system. I suspect that Tesco will attract plenty of listings, but the actual number of completed sales that result will be much, much lower.

The future of estate agency is online for sure, but not in the unsupported way Tesco proposes.

We'll be watching VERY closely to see how they get on.

Online Estate Agents- What are they?

I've seen a lot of press lately refer to many sites as "online estate agents" some correct others, not-so-correct.

I think there is a lot of confusion here in the UK over what exactly an "online estate agent" is.  I believe this is down to the industry growing at such a rapid rate.  There are new additions to the property market on the internet almost every day.  Portals, private sales websites, online agents and property blogs.  It's a confusing array of .com's .co.uk's and .net's.  So lets clear it up a little.

Property Portals

A few years ago, high street estate agents noticed that consumers were looking for property to buy on the internet.  Noticing this new trend a few clever agents banded together and formed the Rightmove property portal.  This would be a place where all estate agents could go and upload all of the properties they held in their portfolio for the world to see.  This lead to a few other startup's appearing to cater for this market.  Sites like Primelocation, Propertyfinder, FindaProperty and Rightmove are now one of the key places people visit when looking for property.

Here at BrightSale, we are not in competition with any of the property portals in any way. In fact it is quite the opposite. We utilise their resources and visitors to give you more chances of selling your home.  Our properties appear on all of the above portals to ensure you get the best exposure for your property as possible.

Private Sales Websites

Often referred to as "online estate agents" private sales websites give users the opportunity to manage the entire property sale themselves.  From creating the listing with photo's all the way down to negotiating and conveyancing. 

Some private sales websites let you list your property for free, others go all the way up to £199 for a listing.  The costs of a private sales website are massively reduced as they don't need staff to help customers deal with the nuances of any property sale.

And that's exactly why they are not "estate agents" not even "online estate agents".  As you are acting in every way as the negotiator, keyholder and viewing correspondent you are the agent.

Whilst private sales can be a cost effective way of selling your property, they fail to support you when you are likely to need it most, and that leads me to...

Online Estate Agents

We believe this is where the future lies for property online.  Online estate agents aim to bridge the gap between private sales and high street agents.  Our research and experience has shown that although many vendors are frustrated with high street estate agents, they still see the benefits of using one.  Many people like the idea of handling a sale alone, but when things begin to go wrong, or complications arise the guidance and professionalism of a good estate agent is tough to replicate with limited experience.

That's why, we have evolved our business model into a "hybrid" of the two.  We can offer you the control and transparency of a private sale, with the experience and support of a team of property professionals to fall back on.  We believe that this setup, similar to that of travel agents and other consumer business' worldwide is the true future of estate agency in the UK.

The purpose of this blog

Honesty, openness and customer control are the core values of BrightSale.  We believe that every aspect of our business should have customer input and feedback.  This blog is not so much as a voice for the company or myself, more a sounding board where you have the chance to ask questions, comment on our views and ultimately let us know how you think we can give you a better service.

Many company blogs are written by a press office, or at best a marketing officer within a company.  They also rarely comment on anything outside of their own press releases.  Here at BrightSale we don't think that makes for a very interesting read. 

Instead, this blog is written by myself Andy Etches - founder and CEO.

I intend to let this blog be a chance for myself and BrightSale to communicate with our customers on a personal level.  I will of course be letting you know of any interesting developments within our company, but I will also be commenting on the property market in general and my favourite subject - the internet and web 2.0!

The best thing about this blog is it is your chance to ask questions, give feedback and generally stay in touch with us directly.

The floor is open as they say! I look forward to hearing from you.

BrightSale Out of Beta!

It's been a long time coming, but we have finally completed version 1.5 of the BrightSale website and removed that charming little "beta" tag from the top left hand corner.

We have now been running the BrightSale website succesfully for 6 long months.  Over that time we've tweaked and honed all of our useful features to a point where we now believe they are totally stable.

That's not to say we are going to stop developing and improving the website.  We've listened carefully to what our customers needs and desires are and we are working to implement as much as we can as time goes on.

We hope to completely change the face of estate agency in the UK over the next year or so.  We want to give customers more control, more chances for people to "call us out" on our mistakes and ultimately create a smoother way to buy and sell property in the UK.

Got some suggestions on how we can improve our service?  Let us know by commenting below.