Miles Shipside

Instead of focusing on what the current market is depriving us of, you should be looking at what you have, what rivals are up to – and selling.

Fifteen great years for estate agency, with low interest rates and easy credit for buyers, resulted in increasingly stretched affordability and consequently fewer people able to move home. Then, along came the credit crunch, proving to be the wild card that has turned a cooling market into a downturn.

Lenders are now looking for ways not to lend. In light of your reduced revenues, you need to skillfully choose and cut overheads, drastically reduce property prices, and utilise new skills and technology to stay trading effectively.

Working your stock

If you manage the right strategy, you can sell your way out of this downturn by taking a bigger market share of the sales that are still happening and create more sales by working your stock better.

Many of you who have been through the 1990s downturn are waiting for enough competitor estate agents to close and then make money out of your resultant increased market share of sales volumes.

But the challenge for you is that today’s media and technology are quite different to what you were used to in the 1990s, which has led to many of you struggling to operate efficiently and, of course, profitably.

While cutting back on expenditure, you still need to market effectively to homemovers and generate business.

The industry needs to change quickly to survive, which means marrying new technology with some of the skills from the early 1990s.

Checklist for success

Change is required but it can be hard to implement, especially in tough times when people tend to revert to their familiar approach. You have more information available now than ever before but it must be used effectively. In order to survive, you must ensure that you:

• use accurate data to position yourself as the market expert in the tougher market;
• use data to dispel uncertainty over price and marketing – you can prove what works;
• find out what your competition is doing;
• use key tools daily and respond quickly to market changes.

Adherence to these tips can result in increased sales and higher fee income.

Our research shows that there are around 15 properties for every one buyer, compared to 7:1 this time last year.

In order to sell in this market is essential that as many of your properties as possible are attractive to prospective buyers.

Differentiate below-market-value property, highlight motivated sellers on the internet, as well as in the local newspaper, devise the most creative and appealing marketing for your bargain properties and stage open houses. You should also consider designing ads that make the features of properties appeal to buyers in an emotive way.

You can also lower prices to improve affordability and aid quicker market recovery by increasing fees or charging motivated sellers upfront for any extra advertising costs. Just be sure to effectively market your properties, your brand and your expertise, using the best of the media and tools available.

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