Purple Bricks - Stories please?

[Rubberduckies]

We are considering selling our house and have been looking around at some of the options.

Someone at work told me about Purple Bricks which looks very interesting, and I like the idea of making it super easy for people to book viewings.

Does anyone have any experience in using them? And did anyone use the eezi conveyancing service like?

I'm also not sure about viewings and whether I would have time or inclination to do this myself - what did others do?

All stories good and bad, especially from the Bournemouth area with expert Mark Turk.

Thanks!

I have just started the sales process with Purple Bricks. So far its been very straightforward.

• My local guy 'Simon' came, valued, measured and took photos 3 weeks ago. With no pressure to instruct and no follow up calls chasing for instruction – just 1 email.

• I instructed them yesterday. I named my own price.

• Got the draft advertisement for my approval this morning.

• Had email from Simon this afternoon asking when I want ad to go live (this weekend) and reminding me to set my online diary so they can see my preferred viewing times.

• Set my viewing availability in online diary. Tues & Thurs 6pm – 8pm and Saturdays 10am – 2.00pm. If a viewer insists on appointment outside these hours they will phone and request.

• Had call from their EPC people this afternoon, who were happy to do EPC inspection at my convenience, between 8 and 9am before I leave for work - fantastic (though I know I could have got it a cheaper elsewhere, I chose the convenience over price).

Can’t fault service so far, despite the fact some reviews have caned them. Let’s see what happens when ad goes live.....

Update on my last message, the advert has now been 'Live' for 3 days. And judging by the response there has been no problem with people logging in and arranging their viewings. My PurpleBricks diary looks like this (just for the 1st open day - I have had 21 viewings confirmed in total over the last 3 days).

Saturday 05 March 2016
Open day: 10:00 - 16:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS edit

10:00 - 10:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
10:00 - 10:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
10:00 - 10:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
10:00 - 10:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
10:00 - 10:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
11:00 - 11:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
11:00 - 11:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
11:00 - 11:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:00 - 12:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:00 - 12:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:00 - 12:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:00 - 12:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:30 - 13:00 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
12:30 - 13:00 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
13:00 - 13:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
13:30 - 14:00 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view
14:00 - 14:30 Mornington Grove, London, E3 4NS view

I'm currently in the process of selling my two bed Edwardian flat in Streatham Hill. I initially decided to give Purple Bricks a try. At first I was impressed: the online platform is good - you have control over the price, the viewings and the photos, and you can see at glance how many people have clicked on your property on Rightmove or Zoopla. However reality soon hit home. Despite the fact I'm told that my flat is in a desirable location and is in a good decorative state I've had no viewings at all and it's been on the market for nearly a month. Not a single person has registered any interest. I reduced the price: still no interest. Statistically a property generates the most interest in the first couple of weeks, so naturally I was concerned. I spoke to a number of other conventional estate agents who all thought the advertised price (recommended by the Purple Bricks local property expert) was far too low. The Purple Bricks price was almost £100k below what other estate agents were suggesting. That annoyed me. One thing which I suspect is putting people off is that in order to book a viewing, prospective buyers have to first set up an account with Purple Bricks. I suspect a lot of people can't be bothered / don't have the time to do that. Overall I'm disappointed. I've decided to pay extra and market the flat with another estate agent.

I wonder whether this has been a problem for my flat. Despite the fact that it's priced relatively low and is in a popular area of London where the market is reasonably lively, and despite the fact that lots of people have clicked on it on Rightmove, I've had no viewings at all: literally none. It's been on the market for a month. I thought I was just unlucky. Then it dawned on me that people could be trying to book viewings, but the Local Property Agent may not be making himself available to conduct the viewings. I have no idea whether this has been happening but it wouldn't surprise me. I've paid up front, so there's no incentive for the Local Property Expert to conduct the viewings - the opposite in fact. I phoned up their central team to ask about this. The person I spoke to admitted it was odd that there had been no viewings at all, and that in theory it was possible people had been enquiring about the property but the Local Property Expert had not made himself available to conduct the viewings. If that has been happening it's pretty poor.

Why don't you get a friend to try to make an appointment Volkswagen?

I think it is important to note a few things about Purplebricks.

There are solely online with just one office nationwide. They employ freelance property agents who are not fully qualified to, say, ARLA level. Each property agent is paid on commission only. No fixed wage or other benefits. Each agent services a very large area so their knowledge is not local as claimed by the website. Servicing such a large area and carrying out so few appràisals over that large area does not make you a local property expert. The turnover of staff is very high as expected with a new company that wants to dominate a huge industry using other people's money. It's a race to the top. Vendors should be a little apprehensive.

They have raised many millions through crowd funding and this money is being spent on TV advertising and other paid advertising online. They actually make a loss at present and some commentators think this is a bubble waiting to explode. Indeed, their share price has dropped by about 25% in the month since it listed on the AIM. Using an online estate agent that is losing many millions per year trying to grow large and dominate so quick just to sell out is a risky bet just to save a few pound. The company may go bust sometime soon. You are selling a very expensive possession. Yes you will save on commission but you may lose out £5,000 or £10,000 or £20,000 on the final value price. Remember, once they have you signed up, you have in effect paid them money and they have little inventive to push your property to find the best possible price.

They also make a huge deal about being available 24/7 online and through the phone. But what's the point? You talk to an outsourced call centre that just 'handles your query and passes it on' Yes you can book viewings online at 2am but why would you do that? I would want the agent to qualify that the person is a suitable buyer before me doing a viewing, saving me and the buyer and the agent wasted time. I would just want a personal service.

Some services that might be traditionally included with the usual estate agents might not be included with this online agent. These might include accompanied viewings, EPCs, for sale boards, descriptions and floor plans and photographs, brochures, mini property website etc etc. You really need to check what they are offering as they have increased their price by a very high percentage recently.

Online estate agents sell a lower percentage of property than traditional estate agents. I can link to a report if needed.

My advice would be to only use an online only estate agent if you know exactly the value of the property and you know that it will sell itself. In my simple opinion that will never happen. For the sake of £500-1000 you might end up losing 10 times more and have lots of hassle to boot.

Just please avoid this online agent.

We bought a property from a vendor using purplebricks and it was a shambles from start to finish. Viewings were fine, but we ended up liaising direct with vendor as they weren't passing messages on. On moving day we ended up parked outside the house for 4 hours before they phoned to say they could release the keys.

However a friend sold through them and it was fine. I think you have to be the type to know what's going on and constantly push push push.

The same type of house as us has their house for sale with purplebricks for about £60k more than we bought ours for . Surely it hasn't gone up that much in a year (this house has a conservatory buy other than that the layout is identical)

I can see the attraction of outfits like Purple Bricks - as an ex EA I do think if you've got a good floor plan, pictures and price then places like rightmove do the majority of the work in attracting a buyer, so arguably paying 1-2.5% is a rip off.
However finding a buyer is the easiest step. The challenge is keeping them, and the rest of the chain together until completion. Small highstreet outfits and online places just don't do this satisfactorily. I was in a chain last year that almost fell apart in the last week because PB had seemingly invented moving dates and not told the rest of us. They hadn't informed their vendor that the date they wanted was out of the question due to another person in the chain being on holiday. The PB vendor was stressed and livid.
So when thinking about the money you could save in EA fees consider the risk in having to do 2 lots of conveyancing and take 6m to move instead of 3 when your chain collapses.

In terms of viewings, the order of preference is:
An EA who knows your house very well
The vendor
An agent who knows nothing about your house
The reason for this is because vendors ime can be too over enthusiastic, not give the viewers some space, not be enthusuastic enough, or continue carrying out their daily tasks so you feel like you're intruding. I'm happy to give anyone tips on doing your own viewings.

As an update to previous post. I’ve now had 30 viewings and 8 offers. The feedback from viewers is positive and many preferred being shown round by me, who can answer their questions about age of boiler, who the neighbours are, the parking etc etc...

The online booking system has worked. The only downside is that on the open days it allows people to turn up at the same time, so at peak times often 2 viewers in the flat at any one time - but it wasn't an issue.

The agent is on standby ready to negotiate, I have asked him to hold off as 4 more people have requested 2nd viewings and I don't wish them to feel rushed.

I have had no problems, I prepared my own details for the flat and handed them out as people entered, the info/photos/floorplan from the web advert plus other info such as Council Tax Band, length of lease, maintenance charge, my solicitor details, gas/elec/broadband provider etc etc which I recommend doing as it was appreciated by viewers.

I do appreciate that for the technophobes out there this could be complicated, and I guess the quality of the agent varies. However I do think that if you are prepared to take interest in the process and responsibility for the viewings this can be a very straightforward and economical way to sell. Purchasers have not reported any negatives either.

An extract from my online progress report:

How is my advert performing generally?
• Days on market 20
• Number of people tracking 10
• Number of viewings arranged (total) - only includes attended viewings and viewings that have yet to take place 38
• Number of viewings cancelled 9
• Number of offers (total) 8
• Number of feedback (total) 11

Feedback given by gaya (viewing on 05/03/2016 at 12:00):
Lovely flat. Seller was very helpful in managing the viewing and answering questions

Feedback given by Ali (viewing on 05/03/2016 at 15:00):
Just brilliant. Absolutely lovely place and Tristan was the best 'estate agent' we've ever dealt with.

Feedback given by Tara (viewing on 09/03/2016 at 18:30):
Great property and seller did excellent job of showing us around. Thanks

Feedback given by Angus (viewing on 05/03/2016 at 14:30):
Tristan was very welcoming. She provided all relevant information and answered our questions fully and honestly. The printed pack was particularly useful.

Offered asking price on a property with purple bricks and are now being asked to offer more.

I am buying a property through Purple Bricks and found the viewing process really easy. Also when meeting the vendor at the viewing you can ask a person with expert knowledge of the property and area, rather than someone who claims they are. Making the offer was really easy to.

I did find however that there was not alot of communication after the offer was made and accepted from Purple Bricks to guide me through the sale. Most ofmy contact was with the owner, which was not a problem for me as I used to be an estate agent and knew the process.

Purple Bricks did step up however at the end of the process when there were alot of delays, mainly caused by Ezie Conveyancing. I certainly would not recommend them as a conveyancer.

I would be very cautious about PB. We live in a desirable area and believed our house would sell itself so went with PB despite the complete professionalism and ineptitude of our "expert" e.g. valued out house by looking at other properties on her phone and kept announcing random figures until she hit on one we thought was ok in a range from £450k to £625k! Plans were wrong - smallest bedroom labelled"cupboard" and no doors into some rooms. Two estate agents were clearly very reluctant to consider offers from us as they didn't want the hassle of dealing with PB so missed out on 2 great places. In the end our £800 got us two viewings and no offers. We then appointed a high street agent and got 15 views and a good offer within 3 days. The offer we made was immediately accepted because our chain was sound and agent very involved. In contrast, once we had paid fee to PB we never heard from our expert again even when we changed agent - utter waste of money.

One piece of advice. STAY AWAY FROM PURPLE BRICKS!!!!!
We put our mum's house on with them after she passed away earlier this year. BIG mistake. All they are concerned with is getting you signed up. Then they have your money and care not whether or not you actually sell. At least with the high street estate agents -they work to sell your property. If not they get nothing. Purple bricks maybe cheaper but they get 100% of people that sign up - whether or not you sell. If you are lucky, you may find a buyer with them. But only somewhere around 40% of viewings come from online means. And your property can very easily be missed depending on search criteria used.
Viewings can only be arranged online and by registering. Not great for those who like to speak to a human, or when their website is down (2 days minimum early April to my knowledge). Their extras do not flow through to rightmove or zoopla. Their stats do not add up. The for sale sign blew down in the storm over 4 week's ago and despite highlighting has only after we submitted a complaint been repaired. We have had 4 viewings in 10 weeks on the market with them. Having seen marketing that they SELL for £798 and told we could defer payment until completion, when saying we wished to deinstruct them. We find that we still have to pay them. Despite several issues and horrendous service they throw their weight around and threaten you with debt collectors. NICE people!!

They have also been spamming other forums saying how wonderful they are.

I tried to book a valuation with them but the website failed. Not a good start.

Purplebricks are terrible. they very nearly lost us our purchase because they had advised the vendor incorrectly about a deadline for the purchase to be completed. We had no contact from purple bricks including the "local agent" after our offer was accepted. the local agent never answered his phone. the next contact we had with him was when we completed and he handed over the keys to us through his car window! we had to deal with the vendor directly on the phone to push the sale forward and get her solicitor to get things in order. the vendor was clueless and her conveyancer was also useless. it's all very well if the buyer/vendor know what they are doing and are happy to deal with each other directly but our sale very nearly fell through due to purple bricks' ineptitude and theit conveyancer's incorrect advice to the vendor. it only went through because our conveyancer knew what she was doing and we were on the ball.

Hi

My partner paid £798 and marketed -please note I state marketed NOT sold his property with purplebricks. His house in a great area with demand outstripping properties for sale 3-1. The house in an excellent condition and excellent location.
The 'Local property expert' visited him. Reeling off statistics left, right and centre and told him - his property would be sold in no time ( he was looking for a quick sale). It seemed to make perfect sense to him. Rather than pay 1-2% to a traditional high street estate agent, Purple bricks would market the property, place on all the property websites etc for the bargain price of £798.
Now - had he sold the property, this would indeed have been a bargain and it obviously can happen (if you believe some of the reviews you see). But do you think it is a bargain to pay just short of £800 for nothing??
In the first week, there was some interest. After only 4 days, a viewing was booked by a cash buyer. An offer of just £2,000 off the full asking price was made the following day. What a success I hear you say aloud. The buyer was 'verified' by the local property expert, so he accepted the offer. Progress from then was slow but he was not unduly concerned. However, please also note - once you accept an offer any further viewings booked are automatically cancelled and further viewings cannot be booked. A couple of weeks later the buyer pulled out - their chain had collapsed - funny, my partner had been told they were cash buyers with no chain (as verified by the local property expert). The property went back on the market and there were a couple of other viewings over the next 10 weeks. However, viewing numbers were very low considering the location, shortage of such houses etc.
A couple of auto generated marketing reports came out - the general gist that good level of interest. No need to do anything. Time marched on. The property expert then suggested trying one of their additions - a bit of a usp to heighten interest so he did this. Had absolutely no interest/viewings arranged. A further four weeks later the expert said that not much was selling in the locality, price is probably too high. Suggested taking £20k off the asking price. As he was keen to sell, he did this. He got a couple more viewings but still no further offers.
After nearly 5 months on the market with Purplebricks he gave up and chose to de instruct purplebricks - so he lost 5 months, had no sale and paid £798 for the privilage.
A week later my partner had his house listed with a high street estate agents. If sold, he would be looking at £2,500 fee but felt he had no option. The estate agent when they visited said that the reduced price was ridiculous, it was hugely under priced. So the property was marketed with them at £10k more than the original price suggested by purplebricks. Within a week, he had had 6 viewings on the property with two offers made. Both at the full asking price. This time - as verified by the agent, the couple were in a position to move quickly as they had nothing to sell.
So-it might seem good value for money and you never know, you might be lucky and sell using purplebricks. If you are not worried about how long the property takes to sell, how much it goes for and are happy to fork out £800 (more if you want them to do viewings), even though you might not sell and it is of no loss to purplebricks if you don't then good luck to you. Personally I think anyone who goes with purple bricks needs their head testing.
If they backed up, we acceptable service levels then they could be a great idea - but lets face it. Why would they be bothered about service once they have got your money. Pre sale/post sale, buyer/seller - service is the same whoever you are. - NON existent!!
Take my advice, go and see a high street estate agent. Negotiate a good rate with them and let them sell your property for you. After all - they get nothing if they don't make a sale so at least you know they are trying.

Negative reviews everywhere you look for this company.

estateagentsuk.co.uk/listings/purplebricks/

Facebook is just as bad the way they aggregate their reviews and work out the average.

On Trustpilot they report reviews and make buyers jump through hoops to keep their review live.

I would simply avoid them!

Sorry, cannot edit above post, but if you want to leave a review, either good or bad then do so at the above link. They do not have affiliation with ANY agent and are not a paid for review site. So all reviews seem to be independent and real - I say with a reasonable amount of confidence.

My personal experience of selling a property with Purplebricks was both disappointing and stressful. Although there was a number of issues with which I was unhappy my chief concern was with the selling process where I believe the consequences of deferring payment were not adequately
explained by their agent. Although I accept that it is contained in the small print of the contract I was unaware at the time signing (electronically) that by taking this option I was then compelled to use their associated conveyancing services and the involvement of yet another party. This meant I couldn't use my normal solicitor. In our case this turned to be more expensive and took 14 weeks to complete a cash sale. There was also a contact duration of 10 months which we were alerted to when we received the contract. Unfortunately there was no mention of using their conveyancing in the said contract. It may be mine was just an isolated case by I would strongly advice anyone thinking of using Purplebricks to cost out the transaction and to ensure they are fully aware of their t&cs that they are agreeing to prior to allowing Purplebricks to act on their behalf.

We will be completing tomorrow, the buyer used purple bricks to sell her house. Her solicitors have been worse than useless, e.g. Taking 6 weeks to pass on the fixtures and fittings form!!!!

My personal experience of selling a property with Purplebricks was both disappointing and stressful. Although there was a number of issues with which I was unhappy my chief concern was with the selling process where I believe the consequences of deferring payment were not adequately explained by their agent. Although I accept that it is contained in the small print of the contract I was unaware at the time signing (electronically) that by taking this option I was then compelled to use their associated conveyancing services and the involvement of yet another party. This meant I couldn't use my normal solicitor. In our case this turned to be more expensive and took 14 weeks to complete a cash sale. There was also a contact duration of 10 months which we were alerted to when we received the contract. Unfortunately there was no mention of using their conveyancing in the said contract.
It may be mine was just an isolated case but I would strongly advice anyone thinking of using Purplebricks to cost out the transaction and to ensure they are fully aware of their t&cs that they are agreeing to prior to allowing Purplebricks to act on their behalf.
For more reviews go to Trust Pilot and filter on stars
uk.trustpilot.com/review/purplebricks.com

Had the house valued by 3 estate agents. 2 of them valued house the same and as purple bricks had a fixed price we went with them. We had accepted an offer within ten days and from there it went downhill
Both the easisolicitors and purple bricks were difficult to reach on the phone and didn't always reply to voicemails. It has now been six months since we put the house up for sale and the buyers have pulled out. This is a problem we were questioning two months ago but no one was giving any answers.
In summary purple bricks can find a buyer but after that you're in your own
And the e solicitor couldn't even get the agreed sale price right despite phone calls and emails
All in all don't use these

As a potential buyer I would not recommend PB to buy or to sell. The experience of phoning them put me in touch with a rude patronising and condescending woman on the end of the phone who would not make an appointment for me to view a property I was interested in as I had used the website before [but was not able to get online at the time]....and directed me back to the website after talking to me for over 7 minutes!

It was all crazy. It gave me no confidence in their customer service of the calibre or professionalism of the staff whatsoever. She was offhand and dismissive. Just amateur. And clearly knew nothing at all about the property or the area.

This is worrying as I am just about to sign with them.

I was impressed by the stats, agree that it is mostly done on-line and the cost saving is huge. (My local agent wants over £15,000, (yes thousand!), to sell my house - that's outrageous). House worth over £800,000 but mostly mortgaged and that's not a lot in London. So ... I thought I'd try PB but your stories make sobering reading.