Low cost Estate Agents

[irregularegular]

Does anyone have experience of using Purple Bricks or other low cost, fixed fee estate agent, either as buyer or seller.

They are soooo much cheaper than paying 1%+ to High Street Agent if you are selling a more expensive house. Just £900 fixed. And another few hundred if you want them to do the viewings.

Just a bit worried that it is too cheap??

Any thoughts?

When we bought this house, the seller used purple bricks. Overall was fine but there were some issues such as the seller not being happy about needing to be in for our mortgage valuation and the purple bricks agent just saying there wasn’t anything they could do and also the solicitor linked to purple bricks was very slow. I think if you want a different solicitor you have to pay an admin fee.
You either pay the fee upfront or after it sells or after a certain length of time (whether it’s sold or not). So if you’re sure it will sell that’s fine but if not then purple bricks has no incentive to help at all as they will get their money anyway

Yes I was worried about the incentives. But I'm told they have significant internal bonuses for sales.

there often seem to be issues with all estate agents!

I wouldn't use purple bricks as their booking system is convoluted and slow. I did use emoov who were great but have since closed.

When I sell this house I will see what the best rate with local is first and if too much I would use yopa if still around.

As a buyer I like that I can book viewings online but I find that the agents don't know the local market very well, or the nuances of a street in the area. We were looking close to a big sports venue and Purple Bricks' agent couldn't comprehend that the streets which get chockablock on match days sell for a discount, which the local agents do.

My friend loves them though, as he says he can see that the vendor has received his offer when it was submitted, not when the agent could be bothered.

Bottom line is why would you pay upfront? You wouldn’t pay a builder or the like upfront beyond may be materials. Why would you pay up front to sell your biggest asset? They have zero incentive to get you a decent price.

Personally, I also think they are in trouble. They’ve pulled out of Australia and I think America too. They are about 6 years old and haven’t made a profit.

They are about 6 years old and haven’t made a profit

Possibly unlikely ever to do so:

uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/think-neil-woodford-favourite-could-092530572.html

I have seen a house thru Purple Bricks and made an offer. A local agent showed me the house but knew nothing about it (very annoying). Also said I had to put offer online but it didn’t seem like the seller saw it for a few days or reacted to it. There was no one I could call to discuss the offer with or ask any questions. I found it all very frustrating and would avoid buying thru them. I think you get what you pay for.

I think the time is long overdue in this country to end the cartel which estate agents operate in trading OUR homes,,,they charge too much and there is a fair bit of sharp practice going on.

House network have just gone into liquidation and have cost us so much time, stress and hassle, I wish we'd just gone with a High Street estate agent from the start. FYI, due to the competition of the online agents, it is worth trying to strike up a decent fixed deal with your local agent at a fraction of the usual cost. We've just done this and have got an agreement on a fixed deal of £2k inc vat. House is on at £420k, so no where near the 1% + vat they were quoting originally. The only downside is that the agent isn't going to be fighting to get you the best price for your property as it isn't going to benefit them, they're just going to want a quick sale. Hope this helps!

Thanks. I started off checking the price to use in negotiating lower rate. then considered actually using them but I am somewhat dubious.

What 'nuances' are there to know? It's quite simple. Most agents use the highly sophisticated valuation system of looking at the price of the most recently sold house in the neighbourhoods. If there happened to be an idiot who overpaid by £100k, suddenly all houses are 'worth' that much. Forget the common sense. In Europe its common to use the total floor area of a house and multiple it by the going rate per square foot. In the UK houses are truly worth however much someone is willing to overpay for them. Anyway, choose Purplebricks. If your house is attractive and reasoanably priced, it will sell like hot cakes. If it's mediocre and overpriced, it'll be on the market for ages regardless of the agent.

*multiply, sorry about the typos. Contrary to the appearances, I do know how to spell and use the apostrophe

@flirtygirl emoov are back up and running now as they were bought out in January.

OP we're currently in the market with emoov. It's very hands on from the vendors side and I've had very little input from anyone from emoov. But that aside it's been fine and if we sell (London market so likely) then we'll have saved over £3000 than the alternative!

I think there is a element of salesmanship involved in selling something as individual as a home. Especially when it is a fairly unique property. Less so when there are lots of similar properties available and people can make a more systematic decision about which one is the best deal.

I've seen close to 30 houses in the last 6 months. The best examples of the salesmanship are 'you can really put your stamp on it' (translation: it's in a worse shape than Roman ruins), 'it's deceptively spacious' (translation: it's only marginally larger than a prison cell can be without breaching the Geneva convention) or 'it has unique period features' (translation :it's really old). If you want to pay extra for that, it's your right.

I guess they are not very good at it then Moomin!

I'm afraid so. But undeniably some homes are so gorgeous they sell themselves, while others need a realistic price to get snapped up. Of course, there will always be outliers (average houses sold for too much money or amazing houses sold for bargain prices).

moomin,,you are so right. What people need to remember is that they are buying the structure and anything else is just sales bluster. Who gives a toss about some ill informed charlattan in a smart car talking crap about putting your stamp on it, talk of master bedrooms,en suites blah blah blah. Their priority is to shift houses and get commission in the till. If that means lying to you and trying to flog your house off cheap in a slow market,well they will do it. Houses are illiquid assets. They are troublesome to sell unlike shares and investments that can be bought and sold with the click of a mouse.

The whole housing system and market in this country needs a major overhaul and the high street estate agents need to lose their virtual monopoly/stranglehold on trading our biggest asset.

Encountered them as a buyer and not good. Had an appointment to view. They cancelled and rebooked me one day later. After I "missed" the first appointment I was bombarded with messages asking why I didn't view and the property was removed from my list, by them.
Scottish system and they went to a closing date too quickly.
I got the property at closing date with a deliberately modest bid. I am sure the vendors could have done better (good reason for this) and my solicitor groaned when I said "purple bricks"

Bought and sold with purple bricks and it was horrendous!!!

Vowed to never ever use an inine agent again, they are absolutely shite. Literally just chuck it on right move and leave you to it. Then drop the price multiple times to get the sale.. which in the end is a lot more money lost than with a proper estate agent