I was asked today what being a new breed of estate agent actually means. Good question, read on.

New pricing –Our selling fees are lower because we have identified & recalculated what the actual cost of selling a property are – this is not about having offices in prominent locations but ensuring we get your property in front of as many prospective buyers as possible, Locally and nationally!  This is achieved through optimum presence on the internet so we do not need to pass on unrealistic charges, especially in austere times! Our attitude is “what does it cost to sell your home” and therefore what should you pay and not “How can we charge the most from every vendor”.

New values – “Traditional” estate agents exploit the boundaries of the profession and many people complain about the service they receive. We have hundreds of satisfied clients who really appreciate our revolutionary concept. The solution is a combination of transparency and honesty in all communication and dealings along with and better access to essential information. All our customers have their own online accounts which mean everything we say and do can be seen and interacted too in real time 24/7. We have abolished contracts so vendors have total flexibility and control.  

New methods – We are a mix of the traditional with the innovative and it goes without saying that our business wouldn’t succeed and our vendors would be disappointed if we didn’t sell property so we prepare your details in the traditional manner but ensure we utilise the web to give your property the maximum exposure. Vendors and purchasers alike are empowered with a suite of tools to value, change house descriptions, offer and arrange viewings which are just a few examples of the interactivity or, if you prefer we do everything. Most customer mix the two.   

New Breed –Estate agency is a people business and our team is brimming with highly professional customer focused individuals who will manage every aspect of your home moving experience, resolving issues quickly and keeping in regular contact with you from the outset in whatever method suits you best, live chat, email, SMS, mobile or calls to your home or work phones . At the team’s heart is the desire to see a change in the perception of estate agency and hopefully you will find this a welcoming and refreshing approach.

Chris Sargisson

Founder

A new survey has reviled that only one agent in London disclosed its fees on its website. About 20% of agents refused to disclose their fees over the phone or via email. 

The survey, by estate agent comparison website ipostcode, looked at 250 agents’ fees across London and found that it is not necessarily in the most expensive postcodes where agents charge the highest fees. 

The majority of the London estate agencies surveyed quoted 1.5% commission, but 15% of agents quoted 1%. The highest commission level quoted was 2.5%. 

There were several postcode where commission levels spanned the range from 1%-2.5%, which means that on a property priced at the London average of £342,749 (according to latest Land Registry figures), the seller could be paying anything from £4,113 to £10,282 including VAT to sell the same home. 

One in four agents said that their fees are negotiable based on either a realistic valuation of the property or depending on the price range of the property.  

The survey also found that estate agent fees in London at an average of 1.7% are more or less in line with the national average of 1.8% – contrary to the perception that London estate agent fees are the highest in the country. 

Remember House Revolution only charge 0.75 % +VAT. No Sale, No Fee, No contract. If you’re looking sell contact or team now: 0845 017 6060     

As the local housing market continues to struggle to generate any volume of sales, it may be tempting to believe that another agent’s grass could be greener. And I’m sure they will each tell you that they have people ready and waiting to buy a home just like yours!

When the market is slow, as it is currently, you just have to be patient and wait for that elusive buyer to come along. If your buyer is out there, they will find you through the combination of Rightmove, Zoopla, FindaProperty and all the other marketing that agents typically do. Swapping agents doesn’t really improve your chances of finding a buyer, it just means that at the point the buyer finds you, you’ll happen to be with a different agent. It’s the housing equivalent of a game of pass the parcel – it’s the agent that has your house at the time the music stops that wins.

While there are so many agents vying for so few properties, agents will behave badly and provoke home sellers to switch away from their existing agent.

Unless you are unhappy with the level of service you are receiving or maybe another agent is genuinely offering something different – a lower fee and better service perhaps (hint hint) – we would encourage you not to switch.

Swapping agents in the belief that they will have buyers that another doesn’t is perhaps a little misguided. And, you may take the parcel away from the agent just before that buyer comes knocking on their door!

Start selling your home with House Revolution and save up to 50% compared with traditional agents fees, call our team on 0845 017 6060 for details or visit www.houserevolution.com

Ever heard someone say, “I’m glad I paid so much to my estate agent. Thank goodness I picked the most expensive one”? No.

Until House Revolution, all estate agents were expensive and some might say not very reassuring!

Being a great estate agent should not be about the size of the fee, but about the strength of their passion to look after customers. Estate agency is not a difficult process. Yes, it takes time, effort and resilience but all agents do the same tasks day in day out and we are no different. So, why pay more?

Our success is not driven by what we charge, but by having the right people in the company. We’ve chosen our people from great customer service industries and then trained them in estate agency, the House Revolution way. Their backgrounds are varied, from Virgin’s cabin crew to childcare.

It suits others to make selling property sound complicated – it justifies the enormous fees. If you’re thinking of using House Revolution please don’t be deflected from doing so by the expensive alternatives daring to suggest that you get what you pay for – the inference being that because we’re low cost our service is going to be less than they would give.

We want to ensure every one of our customers has a great customer service experience and that’s why, in 2010, almost one third of our business came from referrals by happy customers.

To enjoy our great service, please call our team on 0845 017 6060, or go to www.houserevolution.com

House Revolution. A new breed of estate agent. Just £999+VAT to sell any home. No Sale, No Fee and No Contract.

In December, House Revolution concluded the sale of its most expensive property to date; a 6 bedroomed, 5 bathroomed, 3 reception roomed restored Georgian House in Norwich’s Golden Triangle. The property was on the market for just short of £1.2 Million Pounds.

We weren’t the only agent engaged to sell this property, there were two large ‘traditional’ agents involved as well. But we found the buyer and imagine how relieved the owner is that we did.

For a property like that, we believe that a fee of 2% upwards would be charged by a traditional agent, meaning the owners would have been landed with a bill close to £28,000 (including VAT!).

Guess what we charged? Correct! £999+VAT, meaning we’ve saved the owner the cost of a new BMW rather than putting our own staff in one. Why? Because, unlike our competitors, we don’t price on the basis of what we can get away with, we price based on the cost of marketing the property, plus a reasonable profit. With the power of the internet and sites such as Rightmove, it just doesn’t cost any more to sell a house of £1.2 million than one worth £120,000. So why should the customer pay more?

And before someone suggests we just ‘got lucky’, let me tell you that luck had nothing to do with it. We worked as hard to sell this as we do for every property on our books.

We were pleased to have been selected to market this property in the first place, but we’re doubly pleased to have been the agent to sell it, not just because it proves our model really does work for any property, but also because we’ve been able to save this customer such a large amount in fees. What a great way to end our 4th year of trading!

Personally its the Estate Agents commission that is the current ‘Theft’ in property these days and whilst I cant condone vandalism its interesting to see the recent student anarchist taking up our cause

Did you know that, based on the average house price of £167,000 and by using an average estate agents fee of say 1.5% your total estate agency costs are going to be £2943 and £438 pounds of this cost will be the VAT? This might go a little way to explain why nearly all estate agents quote their costs as a percentage adding “oh, plus VAT” at the end

Come January the average VAT bill will increase by a further £63 to £501 making the bill £3006! Eeek again.

House Revolution does the same job as a High Street Agent. We visit your home, take the pictures, manage your sale with real people (I could go on but for more detail go here http://tiny.cc/vsgff ) BUT we charge a fair fixed price of only £1173 of which £174 is the VAT. That’s a saving on the above of £1700….to do the same job …Really Really and because we already charge a lot less our lower cost will means our VAT increase will be only £25 in January …yay!

The big question is, will consumers buy less due to the VAT rise ? I suspect not but it might make them look a little harder for lower priced deals which is good news for us

4 years ago I had no option but to pay an estate agent £6000 to sell my house. I simply wanted to understand how my money was going to be spent. No one was able or willing to provide this essential info so I went about building a business that could do the job better, charge the correct fee and allow the consumers to become more involved in whole process.

Today my biggest challenge is not house sales. Whilst the market is hard going we have sold in excess of 40 million pounds of property over the last few years. Our marketing works !  

Launched on Bonfire night 4 years ago House Revolution, the Norwich based low cost estate agency group, is preparing to celebrate its Birthday with the fantastic news that a new report has positioned House Revolution as the 6th most successful in the UK .

The report, commissioned by The Big Property List, undertook a comparison of online agents looking at their prices, services, year established and the quality and popularity of their websites.

The quality of each online estate agent’s website was judged using an online tool known as Website Grader (WG) which compares various factors to give an overall score out of 100. The factors include online visibility, online popularity and the structure and features of the website.

Founder Chris Sargisson commented “This is great news for us, especially when you consider that shortly after the bonfire fireworks fizzled out four years ago so did the property market! To grow a successful business that delights its customers whilst saving them huge amounts in estate agency fees is a real credit to the team at House Revolution. Whilst we are very happy to take credit for the quality of our website, House Revolution is a fully rounded estate agency service, providing exactly the same service as every other estate agent, but at a more reasonable cost and, of course, we would say better!”

Managing Director Richard Savelli added, ” This past year has seen House Revolution double in size. To cope with this growth has meant recruiting more people as well as expanding our premises. We are expecting to grow by the same amount next year and we aim to be in the top three next time this survey is run.”

That couldn’t be further from the truth -House Revolution is capable of selling any property and the more your home’s worth, the more you stand to save (compared to a traditional agent).

For example if your home is worth £200,000 we can save you around £2500 but

if your home is worth £600,000 the saving is nearer to £9500!

The most expensive home we currently have for sale is priced at £1.2M. That customer stands to save £20,000 when we sell it. That’s just based on 1.5% commission, but on high end properties, it’s normally considerably more.

And we regularly sell homes of higher values:

East Harling £585,000 Sold

South Walsham £650,000 Sold

Trowse £499,950 Sold

Besthorpe £665,000 Sold

Unthank Road £400,000 Sold

So come on, there should be no more excuses. Please give us the opportunity to sell your home and do what we love doing best, saving your money!