Musings of a London Property Finder

In 2008 Foxtons lost approximately half their staff but it wasn’t enough and now BC Partners who bought the infamous estate agents at the height of the property market in June 2007, are seeking a debt for equity deal with lenders.  In a piece in The Guardian newspaper yesterday, the value of the debt to be written off is estimated at £60-£90 million. 

Tellingly Andrew Newingly, BC Partners London head admitted for the first time earlier this year that the firm “had got it wrong”, and that the £370 million purchase of Foxtons had been a mistake.

So for those readers who bought at the top of the market in 2007 just think – it could be worse: you could be down £370 million, not just a few hundred thousand.  And at least you have somewhere to lay your head at night!

And for those of you wishing to dispose discretely of prime London property, or to rent your abode to one of our fabulous tenants, we are the favourite London Property Finders of several discrete top end companies and would be delighted to deal directly with you.

Technorati Tags: Estate Agents, Foxtons, London Property Finder, London property finders, london property news

Tags: Estate Agents, Foxtons, London Property Finder, London property finders, london property news

Musings of a London Property Search Agent

An article has appeared in The Times today, analysing who will stay and who will go, as the property market remains soft.  Clearly some will falter – sales are down 50% so clearly there is 50% less revenue and 50% less fee-earning work. 

We have been surprised at the complacency which has prevailed with some of our contacts over recent months and the continuing lack of ability to be flexible or think outside the box, particularly at some of the larger multi-nationals.  A lack of morale has been equally evident.

Anecdotally, it would seem that Foxtons have shed half their sales force, but losses at an agency which relies very heavily on commission seems to be newbies with no contacts.  We knew there had been redundancies at Savills but Countrywide, Humberts and Halifax have also had problems with the latter closing 50 offices, according to The Times.

Countrywide, the owner of Mann, Bairstow Eves and John D Wood has had its credit rating downgraded by Standard and Poor, however Chief Executive Grenville Turner has been quick to react, saying:

“At the end of the [3rd quarter] we had around £106 million of cash on our balance sheet to protect us from the impact of this market, which is I suspect more than all of our competitors put together.  We intend to keep it that way,” he wrote.

Perhaps staff should not feel reassured as if there is little business being done, the business will have to shed bodies to retain a healthy bottom line.

Inevitably there were going to be losses and good people will lose their jobs.  Interestingly the credit crunch doesn’t appear to have put enterprising agents off going it alone – we know 3 such cases who have opened shop in the last 9 months.  What should be welcomed is the plethora of small agents with little or none of their own property who turn up when they want, masquerade as (bad) property finders with no knowledge or understanding and have no idea about developing relationships, selling, showing property, in short how to do their job.  Numerous sales agents have moved into rentals, which is fine if they know what they are doing, but adds a lot more work and aggro for us if they don’t, as so often seems to be the case.  This London Property Search Agent works through these difficulties to enable people to fulfil their aims.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/construction_and_property/article5141895.ece

Technorati Tags: Estate Agents, Estate Agents Close, Estate Agents Go To The Wall, Halifax, Humberts, London Property Search Agent, Savills

Tags: Estate Agents, Estate Agents Close, Estate Agents Go To The Wall, Halifax, Humberts, London Property Search Agent, Savills