The latest declared runner and rider into the property portal market, WhatHouse, says that it does not feel threatened by Agents’ Mutual’s business model, which insists that its agents must use only one other portal.
WhatHouse managing director Daniel Hill said: “I knew of this before we decided to enter the market. All I can say is that I don’t know if they really can do this – I am not sure, but my belief is that you cannot restrict agents’ advertising.”
He said that even if it split the current duopoly – and that would assume Rightmove holding on to the lion’s share of agents – there would still be the need for a cheaper, challenger model.
He said that WhatHouse’s research showed disenchantment with the level of fees charged by Rightmove and Zoopla, and went on: “My understanding is that Agents’ Mutual will still be charging around £400 a month – cheaper, but still not cheap.”
Hill also said: “Agents’ Mutual as yet has no domain name and no URL. Zoopla has had to make a large number of acquisitions to give it that visibility. Our major strength at Whathouse is that we already have a platform and a fantastic name.”
He said: “I haven’t set off on this journey with any illusions. Of course, if we signed up every estate agent in the country in the next year, I’d be turning cartwheels across Trafalgar Square.
“However, I’m realistic. If we sign up 3,000 or 4,000, I’ll be ecstatic, and if we manage just 1,000 by this time next year, then that will be a very good start, enabling us to build up our offering.
“Our model is that for every 1,000 agents signed up, that is £900,000 which we can plough straight back into the business.”
WhatHouse plans to go live with its estate agency and letting agency portal in mid January, and will charge £75 per month per office. However, Hill admitted that there would be room for negotiations with bigger businesses, and said that there will be some upselling of other products.
He said the site has already recruited some agents and will be holding a recruitment day at Wolverhampton on November 26.
There is more in the interview with WhatHouse, which is in today’s blog section
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Comments
So many say they are not happy with the big 2 but have no choice but to use them.
How can RM be stopped or at least challenge RM and Z? AM want to by changing punters and agents thinking, thats a start but most seem to think this will fail along with all that have tried.
If smaller low cost or free sites cant capture part of the market, then what is the answer?
A 100 million?
He knew of AM before he entered the market. Sounds like a bright man I do not want to give my money to.
Looking at the weather forecast I am not sure opening an office T'up North is such a good idea.
This thread contains a stark warning for Agents Mutual and anyone who runs with the idea but not for the reason stated in the article; the restricted business model did not work first time around and won't work second time around either.
I am keeping my own counsel on this one.
I'm not a gambling man, but I would be prepared to have a bet with any of you that if you walked out into the street, picked a person at random and asked them to name a property website, their answer would be Rightmove.
Bottom line is, unless any new entrant has a huge advertising budget to try to break that monopoly, we're stuck with it.
Love it or hate it, the web (and Rightmove in particular) is where people start their search these days, but I totally agree with PeeBee, it's just one of the tools at our disposal. Like PeeBee, I'm old and ugly enough to remember how we used to do it!
Ampersat - well hello to you also, good Sir! ;o)
Don't you DARE put down your roots in my tattie patch!! You'd be the nearest thing to competition I would have!!
Hmmm... I suppose what I have written does have mixed meanings. You're another 'old soldier',if I may be so rude. You have walked in the moccasins through many seasons, and I guess you know where I'm coming from - but for the benefit of others:
The web is only ONE of the tools we have at our disposal. Not THE tool.
I CAN 'sell' property without the internet. If I couldn't, then I shouldn't be doing the job I do. But many rely heavily on that tool. Many absolutely could not survive without it - the question is, could any of us?
We will never know - because we will never try. It is here - and here to stay. As I said before, RM was originally an instruction-getter for those that pioneered it. It was a competitive advantage. Surely not so now - but in reality it is - in reverse. If you are NOT on it, then you are basically DISadvantaged.
And if you don't get the instruction - you can't sell it!
This is similar to a recent thread about press advertising. I said then - still do and always have - that the one guarantee I make is that if you don't advertise in the press, then you won't get any response from it.
I accept that not every area is 'owned' by RM; that Zoop aren't the portal of choice in certain locations - but at the end of the day, homeowners want their properties banged on the 'net in order to take advantage of the squillion buyers the websites' propaganda screams about (as does that of the Agents that perpetuate the nonsense...).
@ PeeBee on 2013-11-05 15:13:31
Good afternoon,
Hovis: How about 'fat free' or 'low cholesterol’ or ‘slimmer’ or 'cheaper' Hovis for a change - as applicable to a new portal?
Difficult to achieve but I am sure you get my point. ;>)
Amphasat, the point is agents need to use every tool to do the job right. A web site, a portal, a mobile app, yep sure needed like a newspaper advert., a board.
But a web site alone, no way.
Modern day agents will be foolish to forgetting the basics, everything else can be copied, the basic is qualify your buyers, establish their Motivation, their ability and Needs and sell to them.
You work your buyers but you have to select the best to service, reliance on the PC totally and you will fail. Good old fashioned service, well delivered, constantly, makes the very real difference.
Ray Evans - hello matey! ;o)
"You are so right. Agents did it for Rightmove. But it does need a real viable alternative that is controlled by the agents themselves"
But, Ray, that's the point. IT HAS BEEN DONE. The wheel is invented and in motion. Hovis IS the sliced bread that everyone now tries to be "the best thing since" - so WHY would Joe and Jane Public want us to change what they are already indoctrinated - by US - into believing is 'IT'?
We have to accept Fact 1 - Rightmove are way smarter than the Agents they claim to serve.
All pipe line and no stock here PeeBee :-(
You know I'm not that sure that buyers do want their info in one place. I reckon now that the market has turned the onus would be where they can see it first.
If I was heading up a major player in the portal market, I would be visiting my member agents begging them to give me a 24hr exclusives on their stock. A first feed to the chosen portal and the rest can have it after. I'd be ''the first place to find property''. Not only would you knock the sites hits into the long grass but I bet the quality of your leads would be superb as well.
As an agent I'm not upsetting vendors, The phones would already be dialing out, still putting property in front of as many people I can but backing an alternative that actually puts some value on my data. Imagine doing that and having a share in the portal you was backing.
Still what do I know? My backside is still sore from the last RM visit.
I hope you don't mind me asking Peebee but where is your office, I am thinking of opening an office there.
On one hand you are saying you can sell property without the internet yet on the other you are saying that cutting out the portals is akin to having one's Nads removed. Isn't that an oxymoron?
wardy - hellooooo, mon ami! :o)
I couldn't agree more. However, I refer back to my original statements that whether or not I LIKE what RM do to my danglies on a day-in: day-out basis, they do it because they CAN.
We go back far enough for you to know that I was sidelined out of Resi Estate Agency until the beginning of this year when I came back to retread the boards. For quite some time I was, in my then role, vendor/purchaser/adviser - I hired and fired Estate Agents as a part of this. I walked in the moccasins of the vendor - so I saw my own profession from the other side of the fence. It's a side that not many Agents consider looking from - and the view isn't always a pretty one, unfortunately.
What came out of it for me is that as a prospective vendor, I always had t'internet stuffed down my cakehole. If my properties weren't on Rightmove - then they might as well not be for sale. In trying to gain a competitive edge, in reality the Agents I spoke to were relinquishing their own importance in the chain of events in favour of a third-party shop window.
I don't think that has changed - if anything, it is getting worse. You and I know how to sell during a power-cut or hardware failure, wardy - as do many who frequent tis site. HOWEVER, for many others, cut out the portals and you effectively castrate them. Sad, really - but it's a bi-product of our society. And WE have created - and fuelled - this self-perpetuating loop by bumping up the importance of the portals.
No-one would be happier than me if RM were to shrink into infinity just like the picture on our old valve TVs used to... but I simply can't see it happening. Don't know about you - but I believe that sites like this give them STRENGTH. They no doubt monitor these comments. They know what people are doing (or at least talking about doing...) behind their backs - that is the power of t'internet.
To where someone below said "...those greedy b*stards have no business model at all without agents properties, if only everyone could put their properties to invisible...", I would say "Yes, they do - you just don't know what it is" to the first bit, and "That will never happen" to the latter.
Believe me, IF it ever did - then the portals would be in a position to commit a massacre.
Anyway, bud - enough of the morose stuff. We're selling quite nicely here 'oop North - what about you guys??
Vendors want Rightmove, full stop. This is all fluff and noise.
@ Mark Holder on 2013-11-05 12:05:38
"Maybe its time for Agents to start educating the public, but they will need viable alternatives in order to do this"
You are so right. Agents did it for Rightmove. But it does need a real viable alternative that is controlled by the agents themselves
In what I do I talk to agents everyday and I would say that 90% are unhappy with RM and Z. Mainly because of the ever increasing prices and the shocking customer care and the general feeling that there is nothing else.
Most agents would back something else if it was a viable option as in generating leads for sales. That is the game. Unfortunately, as pointed out many times when ever a new site appears, there will be no game changers.
Somehow, the message to stay away from RM and Z needs to be passed on to the public. The only thing the public are really interested in is the costs and selling and buying at the best value for them. if they think its with RM and Z, thats what they will push for.
Maybe its time for Agents to start educating the public, but they will need viable alternatives in order to do this.
PeeBee- Is it just about the monthly subs though?
Like Ray says RM is a company not content with simply advertising your stock. They want to be an integral part of your operation. Ever had the ex travel agent RM rep turn up at your door and then proceed to tell you how to run your own business? I Have.
We can all argue as to whether the subs are too expensive but I think we can all agree that the pricing structure, complications involved additional products and types of memberships are disingenuous.
I don't like having a service provider (who I pay £1200 a month) thinking they have me over a barrel and turning up, cap in hand once every six months. I don't like the way they remove elements of your core membership so they can flog them back to you once you realise they are missing and I despise the attitude of everyone who I have ever dealt with at RM towers.
So I will be backing AM, if only in the hope that it adjusts some of the attitudes of the RM bigwigs.
p.s the RM calenders will make excellent kindling for my bomb fire tonight.
When Agents Mutual (whatever the final name) are up and running - have you seen all the big boys who have signed up, the big two will suffer. The small portals will disappear as will Z who is weaker than RM. If you are on both of these which would you choose to stay on? Z has no cash. They have been spending all their income on building up their portal, RM is loaded.
Methinks that is probably why Z wants to go public. Get some return before the end.
I cannot wait for the day when Rightmove goes tits up and I really believe it will happen, those greedy b*stards have no business model at all without agents properties, if only everyone could put their properties to invisible, it would make a great movie actually!
RM will squeeze agents until the pips squeak - and why not because you will still pay - if it pays you? They will only stop when the pips look as if they will pop. RM will very soon control every aspect of your businesses - unless there is something you can find to do about it and you do it!
yet another Price increase letter from RIGHTMOVE the day after the poxy calender arrived as a sweetner!
Before you read all the comments below have a quick look at the what house website, to be brutal I really can't believe they're trying to market it in its current state. If any company wants to put forward a viable option, first impressions count so don't embarrass yourself.
Anyone taking on RM and Z in RM and Z's home grounds are either very brave, have maybe £100m behind them or are simply fooolish.
Agents have the best solution already. its just they can't see the wood for the trees.
By changing the way agents work and where property stock is advertised and by whom can change where leads come from and too.
Portals are taking too much. Today I had a zoopla eflyer come through offering me insight into my road, prices, and beyond there were links for me to compare mortgages and insurance.
Portals are taking from agents right under their noses and month on returning to repeat time after time.
Portal profits up, agents down. Portals aren't just offering agent's their services. but also offering agent services based on agents property content to pull Joe Consumer in.
There is a solution. A new portal brand is just the icing to the new solution required.
The portal models agents signed up to 15 + years ago didnt charge as much and didnt poach agents business. if you offered todays models to agents years ago, they'd run a mile.
Yet others are now wanting to replicate or clone the big two. We need back to basics. look at agency and look and learn from whats out there.
A portal alone (or if you like the UK's two biggest sub agents RM and Z) isnt the way to move forward.
PropertyLive (remember that?) was responsible for throwing away about £6 million of NFOPP Member's dosh, and now NFOPP is recommending AM for its members to join. Very brave.
Will WhatHouse take off? Will it be successful?
Answer: Who knows?
Is RM or Zoopla worried, not yet, maybe but nobody else seems to be on the same page (sorry about the cliche).
Many sales are being made before they are properly exposed to the market at the moment, so portals are more likely to be circumvented or ignored by agents if possible. Wait for the next recession though.
Discussion will be endless, never to be resolved, as it's just opinion and nothing more.
Time for a glass of decent red.
Mark Holder - "What I am saying is if competition can be increased, then the self created monsters would naturally be reigned in."
No - sorry. Buyers want LESS 'competition'. They want a one-stop shop - ONE one-stop shop. Vendors, on the other hand, want EVERYTHING - they want us to use every possible method available to find them a buyer - and why shouldn't they?
And NEITHER give a fuppenny tuck how much it costs us to give them what they want.
"No point in 100 sites, or 1 site trying to compete unless these sites can provide good genuine leads in a high volume."
But HOW are they to do this, unless they are put on an even footing with the big boys? Even then, how will they?
There needs to be a goose in order to lay a golden egg, I'm sure you agree. So far, ALL of the 'geese' that have stepped (weakly) up to the challenge have been sickly little ducks which have been neither fit for purpose nor capable of even honking like a goose.
Do I believe that RM/Zoop are justified in charging what they do? Yes, actually, I do. Just like I am justified in charging MY fee to a vendor for what I do. That doesn't mean I have to be happy to pay it, however.
At the end of the day, though, RM & Zoop have done what Estate Agents have failed to do with their own services - to put themselves on a pedestal of being a necessity to homeowners.
And they are there because WE pushed them there.
'Pee Bee' I think killing them off would be as disadvantageous then what we have presently. What I am saying is if competition can be increased, then the self created monsters would naturally be reigned in.
No point in 100 sites, or 1 site trying to compete unless these sites can provide good genuine leads in a high volume. As they grow, their influence on the market will. It just takes time and money.
I think everyone wants to see more competition and the market place as in portals have a little more equality to do so.
Mark Holder - I couldn't agree more with your first statement which is my point exactly.
THEN you said " If there are choices and if other portals can influence the market, reclaim some of the market and provide viable competition, eventually RM and Z would have to take note and change. Its just about evening out the playing field."
Mark - there ARE choices. Hundreds of them - thousands, probably. Some paid-for; some 'free' - but NONE are effective. Why should the next, or the next after that, be 'the one'? Because Agents get behind it? Because we all want it to break the hold the others have?
What is being glossed over here is that WE THE AGENTS created the 'duopoly' you describe. WE fed the animal. It was an instruction-getter. It was a 'competitive advantage' over our fellow Agents. It was the thing we told vendors they "must be on" to stand the best chance of getting a buyer at the best price.
And, now... we want to kill it off to save a few quid. That's what this comes down to.
Oh, dear.
'PeeBee' - Breaking the duopoly doesnt mean removing one of them. If there are choices and if other portals can influence the market, reclaim some of the market and provide viable competition, eventually RM and Z would have to take note and change. Its just about evening out the playing field.
Its not as simple as AM saying we have x amount of thousands of agents, all portals need to be saying we have x amounts of thousands wanting to buy and sell. if you have that the agents will come.
Its sending that message out to the public that you dont have to use just the main two. Slowly, they would receive less visits, be requested less but only as long as the other portal(s) are visable and have a similar profile, hence the mega bucks to fund it.
Once there is affordable competition with all portals, the agents will feel that they have regained control. At present you are left with a take or leave it scenario.
'Eddie McGinty' - "Also does anyone know if Agent's Mutual plan to do anything different for consumers, you know, any plans to actually improve the market?"
I would be extremely interested to know what possible plan to improve the market could be formulated, and then executed, by what is essentially a shop window.
'Mark Holder' - " I think most people are agreeing that to break up the duopoly of RM and Zoops is going to take some serious financial backing and AM just doesn't have it "
But, hang on... you're not BREAKING the duopoly - you're simply changing one of the players for another, aren't you?
You are basically agreeing to a substitution. I hope to Hell then that the substitute - signed from nowhere, never played at any level and then cast straight into the premier league - is as up to the game as the current star player you are pulling off.
The only losers are going to be the vendors.
Has anyone received a solicitors letter regarding their Sole Agency restrictions?
@ Eddie McGinty
Your right. In law it would be like vodafone restricting customers from having an orange phone too.
So imagine 6 months on and Agents Mutual fails to break the pull of the big portals on consumers and agents want out, or to start putting their properties on the second portal they left.
I can see Agents Mutual reciving many solicitors letters about agents being engaged under restrictive practice.
It would be nice for Sainsbury's to insist loyalty cards meant *exclusivity* but Im sure Asda and Tesco would be straight on the phone to Trading Standards or even straight into court.
Has any agent actually looked into the legalities of Agent Mutuals 'Wants' - their offering might be promising the illegal.
Agree with Paul Smith.
Also until AM drop their restrictive advertising requirement (which I suspect would not stand up as I think it would be agreed as an unfair term in their contract) then I won't even consider them. But I want to!
I think most people are agreeing that to break up the duopoly of RM and Zoops is going to take some serious financial backing and AM just doesnt have it. And as for their plan to limit agents choices as to where they can list, is only limiting further the choices agents have now.
Its not the agents that have to be convinced to use smaller low cost or free sites but the public that want to sell, buy or rent. Agents need their customers to be saying, I want you to advertise on this site. If they have this they will naturally turn to the other sites as that is what the customer wants.
Viable alternatives are required to ensure that the constant price hikes of the big 2 stops. There has to be more competition to ensure this. But it is how to go about it, fund it and back it is the big question.
Anyone that tries will face aggressive sales campaigns against them.
Dear Agents,
A portal is only as good as the property content.
The Agents themselves, via their 0wn sites, newspapers and offices etc., are the advertising medium. You did it for RM - for NOTHING!
You must support your OWN businesses and your OWN portal ( mind you, it will have to be good ) It will not be that easy but if not RM/Z will control you all fully within (say) 5 years.
Gosh so many new entrants in 2014.
Even if all the entrants bound together they still wouldnt have all the RM and Z built up SEO + vertical searches.
But good luck Daniel.
The only way to create an offence would be to create a totally new model. Playing portals with RM and Z is alike going head on with Tyson.
But change the boxing gloves to a different weapon and new set of rules, then theres a chance.
But not today.
At the risk of sounding stupid, would someone mind explaining to me how Agent's Mutual plan to uphold their ban on "more than one other portal"? Is it just on good faith? It can't be written into the contract can it, surely that's illegal? Also does anyone know if Agent's Mutual plan to do anything different for consumers, you know, any plans to actually improve the market?
My advice would be to get on the phone to Agents Mutual and sell them your domain name and go on a nice, long holiday.
Way more fun than trying to compete with tem, R/M and Zoopla based on your current offering and business model
I have heard that agent mutual are close to doing a deal with Allagents.Their transparent agent scheme has caused them problems as scheme requirements meant that agents must also list on their free portal
I wasted my time signing up for a "six month free trial" of two of three new portals in 2012. I think I got about two leads from each in six months. Pointless. No traffic therefore no value. I wouldn't even do it if it were free given the time it would take to setup.
As much as I would like to see it work, Agents Mutual is unlikely to even survive 12 months in my opinion. It certainly cannot if it sticks to its ridiculous idea of telling agents where else they can advertise. I won't support it on that basis and that rule is going to be very damaging to anyone who does. Even since Agent Nutual announced six months ago the world has moved on. None of us know what is going to hapen in the next 6 months, let alone 5 years which is an eternity in this market and digital marketing. I, fo one, and not going to lose house sales by saying to my vendors 'Er, sorry, I cant do that for you because i signed a piece of paper saying I won't advertise you property on ....' Badly thought through. If Savills and Knight Frank want to turn vendors away, good luck to them. I hope they send them to me.
I'm sorry, but what house doesn't stand a chance. Agents don't just want a lower cost, but control.
I recently has a meeting with AM and in my honest opinion its going to be a game changer. All agents who value their business, don't knock it until you've at least spoken to them.
PaulH, how can you possibly say that Agents Mutual will be the largest portal in 12 months, do you really think Rightmove and Zoopla are not going to up the ante with advertising?? Agents Mutual will not have the cash to promote their site strong enough and its all about consumer traffic.
I would love to see a third (real) option, but I am realistic.
The problem that most of these property portal 'new entrants' don't understand is that until they have a credible product with a high percentage of property stock and a stream of buyers they will not be able to charge agents a fee. The only way a new entrant will be able to compete is to sign up agents (for free), launch a massive media campaign to attract buyers and then start to introduce fees once the product works and can compete with the main portals.
The 'massive media campaigns' are always the missing ingredient to these start ups.
Until there is a split in the market where agents choose Rightmove OR Zoopla we will continue to see enormous price increases. Until then, no new entrant will be able to bring 'competition' to the portal market.
Zoopla must be feeling the pinch, they seem to be on a drive to substantially increase fees (although they seem to be targeting historic Zoopla members and not Digital Property Group members!)
I've heard enough...It is not just about the domain name!Agents mutual will be the biggest portal within 12 months of launch of that I have no doubt..
Its all about advertising of these sites and RM/Z have budgets worth £M's - long gone are the days that anyone can set up a portal on a shoestring. Lets face it, the only agents that will advertise on these will be the ones who cannot afford RM/Z and therefore will have very little to display.
I hate to say it Daniel Hill, if I were you I would invest my money elsewhere - RM/Z shares for instance.
seriously?
this site seems to have no discernable visitor traffic or discernable £ backing to take it forward if it is relying on what revenues will be IF they can achieve x agents on board etc etc blah di blah
new entrants can no more take on rightmove than i can take on tesco because i wake up one morning and decide i'd like to be in grocery retail.
attacking AM to get a headline will make no difference.
We already have a website, catchy(ish) name and are cheap.
Oh dear.