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Twice As Fast - At One-Tenth Of The Price
It's a tough time for the property market right now. In fact since 2007 when sales peaked at well over a million, the following years have been a challenge for UK estate agents not seen since the early 1990's.
Back then, though, at least vendors had the motivation to sell, even though prices were plummeting and buyers were frightened of losing out because of those price drops. And that motivation was, of course, the current interest rate policy. At 15%, nobody was in a position to argue. In 1990, mortgage payments trebled, so however low a buyer's offer may have felt at the time, the vendor realistically couldn't refuse it, especially since the only alternative, if you couldn't keep up with those mortgage payments, was repossession.
But even if values suffered during some property market downturns, at least there has been some kind of liquidity. But now it's a different story: transactional volumes are staying below the half-million mark because buyers are nervous and the media is continuing its daily output of doom and gloom. And these historically low interest rates are permitting sellers to turn down offers they think are too low, as well. So this is why so many properties have been languishing on the market without any buyer interest, and why so many otherwise sellable flats and houses have gone onto the temporary rental market while their owners wait for the market to pick itself back up again.
According to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, it takes the average UK home 109 days to sell. And the vast majority of those sales are thanks to any of the 10,000 traditional High Street estate agencies across the UK. But on closer inspection, it's not the typical agency - the one with high overheads spread across multiple branch offices - that's selling from the enquires it receives itself, but rather those few sales made these days are due to internet enquiries, in particular through Rightmove Estate Agents.
Visits to the UK's busiest property portals increased to a total of 13.8 million unique hits in May 2011, up 20% on the same period in 2010, according to ComRes. Those property portals were Rightmove, Zoopla, Find A Property and Prime Location. Interestingly, though, when it comes to internet estate agents, statistics from eMoov - one of the UK's leading online estate agents - paint a very positive picture: selling a house online through eMoov takes on average just 42 days. That's less than half the time it would take to sell the same property offline ... and as for the estate agent fees? Just one-tenth of the fee charged by a High Street agency.
'The majority of people search online for their next home and that's where our very extensive marketing is concentrated', says Russell Quirk, eMoov's founder. 'Our offering is far cheaper than old fashioned estate agents and now provably twice as successful in selling property', he adds. Worried about it taking an age to sell your property in the current climate and at an estate agents selling fee that is just as unpalatable? Don't be. Internet estate agents eMoov seem to have the solution.
Back then, though, at least vendors had the motivation to sell, even though prices were plummeting and buyers were frightened of losing out because of those price drops. And that motivation was, of course, the current interest rate policy. At 15%, nobody was in a position to argue. In 1990, mortgage payments trebled, so however low a buyer's offer may have felt at the time, the vendor realistically couldn't refuse it, especially since the only alternative, if you couldn't keep up with those mortgage payments, was repossession.
But even if values suffered during some property market downturns, at least there has been some kind of liquidity. But now it's a different story: transactional volumes are staying below the half-million mark because buyers are nervous and the media is continuing its daily output of doom and gloom. And these historically low interest rates are permitting sellers to turn down offers they think are too low, as well. So this is why so many properties have been languishing on the market without any buyer interest, and why so many otherwise sellable flats and houses have gone onto the temporary rental market while their owners wait for the market to pick itself back up again.
According to the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, it takes the average UK home 109 days to sell. And the vast majority of those sales are thanks to any of the 10,000 traditional High Street estate agencies across the UK. But on closer inspection, it's not the typical agency - the one with high overheads spread across multiple branch offices - that's selling from the enquires it receives itself, but rather those few sales made these days are due to internet enquiries, in particular through Rightmove Estate Agents.
Visits to the UK's busiest property portals increased to a total of 13.8 million unique hits in May 2011, up 20% on the same period in 2010, according to ComRes. Those property portals were Rightmove, Zoopla, Find A Property and Prime Location. Interestingly, though, when it comes to internet estate agents, statistics from eMoov - one of the UK's leading online estate agents - paint a very positive picture: selling a house online through eMoov takes on average just 42 days. That's less than half the time it would take to sell the same property offline ... and as for the estate agent fees? Just one-tenth of the fee charged by a High Street agency.
'The majority of people search online for their next home and that's where our very extensive marketing is concentrated', says Russell Quirk, eMoov's founder. 'Our offering is far cheaper than old fashioned estate agents and now provably twice as successful in selling property', he adds. Worried about it taking an age to sell your property in the current climate and at an estate agents selling fee that is just as unpalatable? Don't be. Internet estate agents eMoov seem to have the solution.
About the Author:
Going to high street estate agents means paying high estate agents fees. Using eMoov, the UK's leading online estate agents instead will get your estate sold by showing it to 170 million web users each month. No extortionate commissions, no percentage fees, no sole agency tie ins. Just a lot of fixed, low cost estate agents fees which might even make you start to like estate agents again.