It looks as if its going to happen. Rightmove desparately buying back their own shares to bolster the price, their CEO selling over £1m of shares.

So, how does this change things?

Do EAs give up on matching buyers with sellers and focus on doing what they do best? That being (IMHO) :-

- Actually selling the property. By that I mean knowing how to describe, sell and market the property to buyers in all their activities including the all-important viewing. Is it now the viewing that is the role of the EA?

- Service. For those that just don’t have the time nor the inclination to sell their own house on Google the service now has to be exemplary, surely? Chain management being the most important part.

In the internet age, is matching a buyer to a seller now a dead role for the EA?

Very interesting question James.

Judging by how some agents operate around our way (no names!), I’d say that several have already stopped bothering to match. You can register with them and get literally no response, even when you’ve spotted that they’ve listed what might be a suitable property on Rightmove.

But the good ones? The ones who build a relationship with you? Who you might actually be interested in using the next time you move? Those agents will use every opportunity they can get to communicate with you, surely?

Martin

I believe it’s service – negotiating the deal, holding it and nursing it to conclusion and being more objective than a buyer and seller interacting directly that will keep estate agents in the loop. Would you trust someone you know to act on your behalf or rely solely on a website and your own (no disrespect to the house buying and selling public) limited experience? How much time can the average buyer / seller devote out of their working day?

I think the effect on Rightmove is a bit OTT. Google’s offering is an addition to the marketing mix not instead of – apart, maybe, from lots of ad’s in newspapers!

I believe it’s service – negotiating the deal, holding it and nursing it to conclusion and being more objective than a buyer and seller interacting directly that will keep estate agents in the loop. Would you trust someone you know to act on your behalf or rely solely on a website and your own (no disrespect to the house buying and selling public) limited experience? How much time can the average buyer / seller devote out of their working day?

I think the effect on Rightmove is a bit OTT. Google’s offering is an addition to the marketing mix not instead of – apart, maybe, from lots of ad’s in newspapers!

Which is more common, an agent matching a buyer with a property, or, a buyer simply entering search criteria himself and taking his pick from those that match?

The rise in popularity of the portals is for good reason. They allow buyers freedom to search for property anonymously, without fear of being sold to. Deserved or not, the public have a great mistrust of agents in general.

I found this quote last week that really spells it out “Don’t estate agents know that customers don’t know whether to believe the number of rooms stated in an agent’s description let alone fine details such as whether they are magnificent, stunning, unrivalled, spectacular, exceptional, breathtaking or moments away from transport and local amenities?”

My belief is that that people buy property, they are seldom truly sold it.

The only thing that will sell a property is a viewing. So, the real work is in selling the viewing.

Knowing where and how buyers search and that buyers mistrust agents descriptions leads me to one conclusion. If it really is that good…..show it to them.
If it has a spectacular view, fabulous kitchen etc. don’t tell me…I’m unlikely to believe you…show me. In fact, if you are telling me and not showing me, I really won’t believe you. After all you are a silver tongued salesman, you would not hide something like that up your sleeve, you would ram it down my throat.

Images, still photographs and particularly video do the job far better than any amount of flowery narrative.
Yet the use of video is slow to catch on and the standard of still images dismal. Most agents seem to believe that it is OK to present a property with just a handful of amateur quality, business card sized snaps and lashings of bull.

You can do little to “sell” a property but there is heaps that can be done to market it. A spectacularly marketed property gets more clicks which turn into more viewings which increases the chance of a buyer turning up and actually buying it.

Buyers love spectacular presentation, sellers love spectacular presentation. Estate agents are starting to catch on….slowly.