RESIDENTIALlettings
The elevaTor TesT How to choose? Each franchisor proposes their USPs
Your Move “Your Move is now the UK’s largest single estate
agency brand so our franchisees benefit from more widespread brand awareness – including the UK’s most visited estate agency website. Your Move also offers dual branding opportunities which many franchisees appreciate especially if they have connections with the local community in which they operate. They also have multi income stream opportunities – sales, lettings, financial services, conveyancing etc.”
belvoir “Belvoir has three core principles
– consistent and high quality customer service, specialism as a lettings agent, and professionalism. These three core principles, together with Belvoir’s outstanding reputation in the industry and its highly recognized brand, help to ensure that Belvoir is well on its way to becoming the agent of choice in the UK for landlords and tenants.”
Hunters “We believe we can help our
franchisees to make a lot more money than they would with any other franchise. Even pre-credit crunch, the average profit margin in this industry is six per cent and the average turnover £200k – so the average profit per office is only £12k. To make worthwhile profits you need high market share and high fees – our proven marketing formula delivers this. “Our marketing strategy is
supported by a new brand ambassador, Linda Barker, formerly of Changing Rooms. We think this is a first for this industry and we are very excited.”
aspire “For customers Aspire means consistently high service levels allied to
innovative marketing; for the franchisee it’s the tools to deliver these – allied to membership of a first-class close-knit community of culturally like-minded London property professionals.”
Winkworth “The majority of
local agencies are looking for the London connection – an area that we have the biggest presence out of our network and the largest single brand agency in London. Winkworth’s history over the last 175 years in this market means that we have built up significant goodwill that we transfer to our new offices. Owning a Winkworth office means that you can benefit from this goodwill and draw from a very highly regarded brand name whilst also fulfilling a dream of being your own boss.”
HomeXperts “Our business model has
revisited the traditional agency and re-designed all processes to look at each from the customers view point to achieve maximum customer satisfaction. “HomeXperts have extensively
researched the market and have built a modern estate and lettings agency model designed for today’s property market. This includes innovative guerrilla marketing and franchisees have access to over 70 well designed marketing documents, leaflets and brochures. “Our franchisees have access to our
online franchisee portal with all services provided online.”
Martin & Co “Lettings is our only
business therefore lettings specialists, the most visited lettings agent website in the UK, solely a franchise organisation (no company shops), UK wide.”
reeds rains “Of the many first class
components of the franchise – brand in place 150 years, economies of scale, additional income streams, innovative marketing, integrated technology platform, comprehensive training, integrated network etc – it’s the high quality hands-on business advice, at start up and ongoing, from experienced business professionals that sets this franchise apart from its peers.”
More minis! But this is a major adventure
‘We have farmers, ex-military personnel, ex-policemen,
marketing managers, family member teams and many others who all run successful Belvoir offices.’ dorian gonsalves belvoir
THe losers With all this serious marshalling of the negatives to balance the perceived positives, how many franchisees do fall by the wayside? There have been reports in the last couple of years of failures, frauds and general bad behaviour in estate agency franchisees, which have led some franchisors to review their management procedures, but while the cases are always high profile, they are rare. The Reeds Rains franchise launched
immediately before Northern Rock. “Hindsight is a wonderful thing,” says Roy Gover, “there was a small failure rate in 2008 but those who hunkered down have stayed the course. Only one failure in 2010 and one sale. We find that franchisees usually sell because of a change in their personal circumstances rather than business reasons.” Winkworth reports one or two resales
a year. “In some cases this is a sale to a manager, in full or part, and in other cases it may be to somebody from outside the Winkworth network like our recent sale in Barnet,” says James Trimble. “Over the years people have sold for
many reasons, age, lifestyle, profit – but there isn’t really a single factor. Our franchisees tend to be very long term (one since 1981) and so far we have renewed every contract that has come to the end of the term – without fail.” A candid Kevin Hollinrake admits to
some problems. “I think it’s fair to say that we’ve made some selection mistakes and having had some franchisees establish themselves in the years immediately preceding 2007/2008 we have had
PROPERTYdrum MARCH 2011 17
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