That would be some football match score!
Part of my job is going round the Country giving talks / seminars / workshops to groups of estate and letting agents. The amount of nectar points I am collecting with the train miles I am clocking up – I will be able to have my Christmas shopping for free – I’m even on first name terms with train drivers!
Anyway, I was at conference the other week where I was asked to give the key note speech to the Managers and Directors of this 17 office network. However, in the morning, we had break out sessions. My breakout session was about the threat of online/hybrid estate agents.
What the people didn’t know is that for the last year, I have been carrying out a monthly check on 43 locations around the UK on the number of properties that the online/hybrids have been putting on. Each month, over the last year, in each of those 43 locations, I have gone onto to Rightmove and added up the new listings.
As I was in the North, the nearest sample town was Hull.
I stated that 6,914 properties (excluding re-lists) had come on to the market in the last 12 months in Hull (including Hessle and Cottingham if you know the place).
I asked every group two questions
- Of those 6,914 resi sales listings in Hull in the last 12 months – how many of those came on the market with online / hybrid agents? (Purplebricks/Yopa/eMoov/Express/Springbok/House Network etc)
- .. and of that figure from Q1 - how many of that those were with Purplebricks?
Have a think – what would your answer be?
So I asked them to write the numbers on two post it notes (without names to protect the innocent)and stick them on the wall
The average answer given for Q1 was 1,250 and the average answer for Q2 was 675.
Here are the answers (and here is the weird thing) – the proportion /percentages are almost identically around the Country for every town.
- Purplebricks 172
- Springbok 42
- Express Agency 29
- eMoov 27
- Tepillo 26
- Ewemove 23
- Yopa 20
- House Network 17
- Sell Simple 12
- Bristish Home Sellers 8
- Get me Moved 7
- Visum 7
- Hatched 5
- Easy Property 2
Total New Listings for the Online/Hybrids = 397
… meaning 6,517 went on the market with traditional agents
Whilst you are worried and concerned about the online/ hybrid threat – they only have 5.7% of the market (remember the numbers are almost identical around the UK) – instead, you should be worried about the other competitors in your town whom have 94.3% of the market.
If you want to know the numbers for your location – drop me note and will be happy to tell you.
kind regards
Christopher Watkin
christopher@christopherwatkin.co.uk
