Controversial private sales website takes over disability property register

The Accessible Property Register, a website specialising in promoting wheelchair-accessible homes, has been taken over by TheHouseShop.com. 

APR was set up by husband and wife Conrad Hodgkinson and Christine Barton in 2003, following their own experiences struggling to find a wheelchair-friendly home. It has gained a significant media profile and is well-known to many agents and consumers who find it difficult to find accessible or adapted homes on mainstream websites and portals.

The site is now overseen by TheHouseShop a private house sales website which until 10 months ago was known as The Little House Company. TheHouseShop is a controversial site in the eyes of some property professionals as it allows private owners and landlords to list properties directly for sale or to rent alongside homes from agents and developers.

“Over the decade or more that The Little House Company was in business, we were contacted by countless homeowners of accessible or adapted properties who had been disappointed by the lack of specialised service offered by estate agents. In the past, many agents found it difficult to market accessible properties effectively, as they quite simply did not know how, or where, to advertise them” Nick Marr, co-founder of TheHouseShop, has told Estate Agent Today.

“Now we can offer agents an affordable, effective and comprehensive advertising service that will allow them to take on new instructions from accessible homeowners and expand into the accessible property niche.”

He is now offering agents the chance to market accessible or adapted properties through APR for £19.99 per month, with the choice that they can also advertise the same properties on TheHouseShop. 

Marr says TheHouseShop is already working with estate agents, sellers, landlords and developers including Barratt, L&Q and Taylor Wimpey, to help market  accessible homes. 

“For us, one of the most important aspects of taking on the Accessible Property Register website is that now we can offer a truly comprehensive marketing service to all of our clients, be they developers, estate agents or individual homeowners. We can now offer a service that combines the mainstream market exposure of TheHouseShop.com with the specialist niche market exposure of Accessible Property Register – which we think is a valuable and attractive proposition.”