Estate Agent Performance Index

ULS Group Annual Report 2015
Estate Agent Performance Index
June 2015
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Introduction
Selling your home is one of the biggest decisions you can make in your life, both financially
and personally. The entire process can be extremely stressful and your choice of estate agent
is often a crucial factor in defining what kind of experience you will have.
Until now, there has been a distinct lack of data or science to help house-sellers select the
best estate agent. Most people will speak to friends about their experiences, go out to meet
one or two estate agents, and finally invite two or three agents to visit the property to carry
out a valuation. As a result, sellers often end up choosing an agent based on the suggested
asking price or commission – and ultimately whether they like the person or not. None of
these factors is real science, however, and therefore will not guarantee the best outcome for
the seller.
To address this issue, UHS, a subsidiary of ULS Technology plc, has launched estateagent4me,
which will be the first performance-based estate agency comparison site. The site, which is
totally impartial, uses data collected across all estate agents, regardless of whether it is a
High Street brand or an online agent, national firm or independent.
With so many options to choose from when selling a home, it’s important that property
owners have a unique and fresh array of performance data that allows them to see, for the
first time, who is the best estate agent to sell their property, based upon the criteria that are
most important to them and their own personal circumstances. estateagent4me makes this
possible.
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Asking price
performance
It is interesting to note where
and how often agents are
able to achieve a sale at – or
more than – the asking price.
Outer London1 was identified
as the region where sellers
are likely to achieve closest
to their asking price (97.6%),
whilst sellers in Bristol receive
an average of 97.4% of their
asking price. As percentages,
these figures may seem very
close, but it is interesting to
look at how this translates
into financial gains. For
example, in prime parts of
London2, sellers will accept
an offer that is £47,272 below
the asking price on average,
whilst in Sheffield, this figure
is just £5,245. Overall, the
average house seller could
have received an additional
£27,456 for their property had
their estate agent performed
as well as the best.
Top 3 agents
£ over
asking price
£15,083
Winkworth
(Palmers Green)
Douglas Allen
(Dalston)
13 Kingsland,High
Street, Hackney,
London,
E8 2JS
£16,215
393 Green Lanes, Palmers Green,
N13 4JG
The average asking price
performance in the following
regions and cities
Region/City
Av. asking
price
Valuation Valuation
accuracy % accuracy £
England
£225,000
95.9%
-£12,792
Wales
£169,500
93.4%
-£11,658
Prime London £950,000
96.1%
-£47,272
Outer London £499,995
97.6%
-£15,858
Liverpool
£115,000
93.9%
-£10,647
Manchester
£135,000
95.5%
-£8,112
Bristol
£230,000
97.4%
-£7,704
Birmingham
£149,950
95.2%
-£9,544
Leeds
£159,950
94.8%
-£10,825
Sheffield
£127,748
96.5%
-£5,245
Cardiff
£180,000
96.3%
-£8,495
Nottingham
£120,000
95.7%
-£7,154
Reading
£289,475
97.2%
-£8,693
1 London areas outside the ‘prime locations’ listed above. 2 Prime parts
of London include Belgravia, Chelsea, Hyde Park, Islington, Kensington,
Knightsbridge, Marylebone, Mayfair, Notting Hill, Regent’s Park, St John’s
Wood and the Thames riverfront from Battersea Bridge in the west running
east to include London’s South Bank. The City and the ‘City fringe’ (the
half-mile fringe surrounding most of the City including Clerkenwell and
Farringdon in the west and Shoreditch and Whitechapel in the east) are
also included, along with Canary Wharf, Fulham, Hampstead, Richmond,
Wandsworth, Wapping and Wimbledon.
The top 3 estate agents in getting the best
price for sellers in £ terms + how much they
are over asking price in % terms
% over
asking price
107.7%
Hastings International
(Rotherhithe)
107.2%
Connells
(Southville)
167b Rotherhithe Street, London,
SE16 5QW
243 North Street,
Bristol,
BS3 1JN
£31,105
108.9%
Hastings International
(Rotherhithe)
Whitehouse Estate
Agents (Bournemouth)
167b Rotherhithe Street, London,
47 Poole Road, Bournemouth,
SE16 5QW
BH4 9BA
3
Most popular
agents
Estate agents play a vital role in the
house-buying process, which is precisely
why so many continue to thrive. Whilst
the large (and growing) number of online
estate agents may be able to offer
the latest technology, traditional high
street agents are managing to remain
competitive by combining much of this
same technology with a focus on service.
We therefore wanted to take onlineonly agents out of the equation to see
how many listings traditional agents
are managing to attract from would-be
sellers. Move Residential in Liverpool
outstripped the competition by securing
768 separate properties to sell, followed
by Valentines Estate Agents in Wallasey,
Merseyside (501) and Keenan Estate
Agents in Accrington, Lancashire (468). In
terms of geography, Liverpool currently
has the most residential listings, with 672
properties for sale, compared to 297 in
Wales and 198 in prime parts of London.
Top 8 estate agents with
the most listings in England and
Wales
Agent name
For sale count
Move Residential (Liverpool)
768
Valentines Estate Agents
(Wallasey)
Keenan Estate Agents
(Accrington)
501
468
Richard Kendall (Wakefield)
392
Connells (Wolverhampton)
351
Jackson Green & Preston
(Grimsby)
Poole Townsend
(Barrow-in-Furness)
Robinsons (Hartlepool)
343
342
337
Estate agents with the most
listings in the following regions and cities
Region/City
Estate agent with the most listings
No. of listings
Outer London
City Quays (Canada Water)
181
Prime London
Garton Jones (Nine Elms)
198
Wales
Town & Country Property Services (Wrexham)
297
Liverpool
Move Residential (Liverpool)
672
Manchester
Bridgfords (Withington)
97
Bristol
Connells (Southville)
41
Birmingham
Connells (Birmingham City)
111
Leeds
Waite & Co (Horsforth)
126
Sheffield
Haybrook (Chapeltown)
100
Cardiff
Kelvin Francis Ltd (Cardiff)
91
Nottingham
Haart (Nottingham)
159
Reading
Chancellors (Reading)
37
4
Time taken
to sell
In some parts of the country,
competition for housing has
never been greater, with low
interest rates and initiatives
like Help to Buy fuelling
demand. We decided to take
a closer look at the average
time it takes for a property
to go from estate agent
instruction to Sold Subject
to Contract (STC), across
different agencies and
regions.
Average time for a property to go
from agent instruction to Sold STC
across the following cities and
regions
In Bristol and Reading,
it takes an average of
just 26 days between an
agent starting to market
a property and actually
selling it (STC) – which is
more than three times
faster than estate agents
selling property in Wales
(89 days) and Liverpool (85
days). Sales in Nottingham
are also more sluggish,
with an average period of
56 days from listing to sold
STC, but still just one day
behind the overall average
(55 days).
Region
Av. selling days
England
53.0
Wales
89.0
Prime London
55.0
Outer London
43.0
Liverpool
85.0
Manchester
58.0
Bristol
26.0
Birmingham
57.0
Leeds
62.0
Sheffield
51.0
Cardiff
49.0
Nottingham
56.0
Reading
26.0
Many agents out-performed
these figures, however.
Lawson Rose in Southsea
was able to progress its
listings to ‘sold STC’ in just
8 days on average – which
was the same timescale as
Leaders in Waterlooville.
Winkworth in Reading was
only slightly behind, with an
average of 9 days.
5
Average time for a property to go from agent instruction to Sold STC at
top performing agencies
Region/City
Agent name
Agent address
Median selling
days
England
Lawson Rose, Southsea
131 Winter Road, Southsea, PO4 8DS
8.0
England
Leaders
55-59 London Road, Waterlooville, PO7 7EX
8.0
England
Home Estate Agents
222 Monton Road, Eccles, Manchester, M30
9LJ
9.5
Wales
Meadow Vale - Penarth
3 Andrews Buildings Stanwell Road,
Penarth, CF64 2AA
8.5
Prime London
Matthew Swing & Partners (Whitton)
131 Percy Road, Whitton, TW2 6HT
8.0
Outer London
Parry & Drewett
1 Grove Road Surrey, Sutton, SM1 1BB
10.0
Liverpool
Sutton Kersh
2 Cotton Street, Merseyside, L3 7DY
31.0
Manchester
Ascend
275 Deansgate, Manchester, M3 4EL
11.5
Bristol
Moorfield Estate Agents - Redfield
159 Church Road Redfield, Bristol, Bristol,
BS5 9LA
8.0
Birmingham
Bracebridge Homes
1a Coleshill Street, Sutton Coldfield, B72 1SD
14.0
Leeds
AR Estate Agents - Crossgates
3 Terminus Parade, 60 Station Road,
Crossgates, LS15 7JZ
14.0
Sheffield
Staves Estate Agent
212 White Lane, Sheffield, S12 3GL
15.0
Cardiff
Matthews Estate Agents, Cardiff
23 Clearwater Way, Lakeside, Cardiff, CF23
6DL
14.0
Nottingham
HoldenCopley
26 High Street, Arnold, Nottingham, NG5
7DZ
27.0
Reading
Winkworth
Blagrave House 17 Blagrave Street, Reading,
RG1 1QB
9.0
Fastest
1
Bristol
26 days
2
Reading
26 days
3
Outer London
43 days
Leeds
62 days
3
Liverpool
85 days
2
Wales
89 days
1
Slowest
6
Best
sellers
Another key metric available from estateagent4me is an estate agent’s ‘success rate’, which
refers to the percentage of properties that it has sold, compared to the total number of
properties listed with that agent. We’ve chosen to show just the top estate agents here in
order to highlight the positive outcomes that estate agents achieve, rather than exposing the
weaker performers.
Our data shows that a number of agents have managed to sell 100% of the properties
they’ve listed during the past six months, whilst Richard Harding in Bristol managed to sell
96.4%, followed by Jon Rosi Management in Reading (94.7%). Hadlands Estate Agents in
Buckinghamshire, Blue Estate Agents in Hounslow and Living Property in Norfolk had the
highest success rates overall, having sold 100% of the properties listed in the past six
months. Arch Estates Ltd, in Birmingham, managed to achieve the same, with
another score of 100%.
The best performers based on the % of
property stock they actually sell (across
the following cities / regions)
Area code
Agent name
Agent address
Success
rate
England
Hadlands
17 Chesham Road, Amersham, Buckinghamshire, HP6 5HN
100.0%
England
Blue Estate Agents
315 Vicarage Farm Road, Heston, Hounslow, TW5 0DR
100.0%
England
Living Property
Attleborough Connaught Plain, Attleborough Norfolk NR17 2EJ
100.0%
Prime London
Castles Estate Agents
12 Topsfield Parade Crouch End, London, N8 8PR
100.0%
Outer London
Blue Estate Agents
315 Vicarage Farm Road, Heston, Hounslow, TW5 0DR
100.0%
Manchester
Braemar Estates
10th Floor No1 Marsden Street, Manchester, M2 1HW
90.9%
Bristol
Richard Harding
124 Whiteladies Road, Clifton, Bristol, BS8 2RP
96.4%
Birmingham
Arch Estates Ltd, Barnt Green
The Pavillion, 2 Dunedin Drive, Barnt Green, B45 8HZ
100.0%
Leeds
AR Estate Agents - Crossgates
3 Terminus Parade, 60 Station Road, Crossgates, LS15 7JZ
92.3%
Sheffield
Redbrik
987 Abbeydale Road, Sheffield, S7 2QD
93.0%
Cardiff
Mansells - Rhiwbina
3, Heol y Deri, Rhiwbina, Glamorgan, CF14 2BT
91.2%
Nottingham
MS Estates
59 Lenton Boulevard, Lenton, NG7 2FQ
93.8%
Reading
Jon Rosi Management
50 London Street, Reading, RG1 4SQ
94.7%
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ULS Group Annual Report 2015
About estateagent4me
estateagent4me provides information to consumers on the performance of estate agencies
to help them choose the right agency for them. Data available through the estateagent4me
website currently covers properties for sale in England and Wales (expanding to Scotland and
Northern Ireland soon) and is free for consumers to use.
estateagent4me is owned by United Home Services Ltd, a subsidiary of ULS Technology
plc. The Group has grown impressively since it was founded in 2003. Its technology creates
innovative software to help customers find the property services that are best for them. The
Group also owns the eConveyancer and the Legal Eye brands.
Methodology
Data taken from November 2014 – May 2015, drawing upon a number of sources, including
property advertised on the internet, the Land Registry, information provided by estate agents
and estateagent4me market research.
Disclaimer
The Estate Agent Performance Index is compiled from a variety of sources. We have
endeavoured to verify the information but we make no representation as to the accuracy,
completeness, relevance or appropriateness of any information. We cannot be held
responsible for any action (or decision not to take action) made in reliance upon the
content of this information. We reserve the right to vary our methodology and to edit or
discontinue the Index at any time. Mention of particular Estate Agencies or other third parties
in this Index is for information and comparison purposes only and constitutes neither an
endorsement nor a recommendation.
Copyright United Home Services Ltd 2015
The Old Grammar School
Church Road
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Oxfordshire
OX9 3AJ
Tel: 01844 265432
Fax: 08432 906959
Web: www.estateagent4me.co.uk
Email: [email protected]
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