Real Estate Agent recommendations

[RedVelvetCake40]

Dears, We are planning to move to UK over this year summers. My daughter will go to a school in Dulwich and i still have to finalize the school for my younger one. I am haunted by the task of looking for a house in or near London. I have looked into the websites of Rightmove and Zoopla. But i am completely in the need of a good Real Estate agent or agency who can help us in this whole journey.
Can you please provide some recommendations based on your experiences.

To be honest, it doesn't matter how good the estate agent is, if they aren't marketing the house you're interested in.

We browsed zoopla and Rightmove and made a note of the estate agents that were regularly appearing on houses we liked the look of, then contacted them.

The thing is as a buyer you are never the agents client.
If you have a massive budget looking at something like Knight Franks buying solution might be a good idea but otherwise you might just have to accept that you aren’t the client and can’t expect to necessarily be treated like one!

Do you mean someone who’ll do the searching for you? There do exist property search companies - I’m sure google will find one for you - but I gather they are more often used for higher end properties, and in London higher-end means very expensive. I have no idea what they charge, though, or whether it’s a flat fee or a percentage.

If you’re coming from the US, I think the system is different there - you have brokers who work with the agents, or at least that’s what I’ve gathered from a sister who lives there.

Otherwise (for most of us) it’s just a case of a lot of checking on the various websites and viewing any we like the look of, which will mean registering with the agent first.

House buying in England is a horrific (and often very lengthy) process, in case you are not aware. Agents work for the vendor, not for the buyer. You can find the perfect house, spend quite a bit of money on surveys etc, only to have the vendor change their mind/increase the price/take it off the market. Nothing is certain until you have exchanged. There must be very few home owners in England (and Wales, but not Scotland) who haven't got some sort of horror story about house purchases. You may find someone who can deal with your side by proxy, but it is not something I've come across. If you are relocating because of your job, does your company provide any advice and assistance?
Agents are just called estate agents here btw. It is a fairly friendless profession.

Further to my reply, I had a look online and their are property finding companies in london who will do everything for you, but probably at a cost. It all depends on your budget really. Have a Google. Good luck.

You're probably thinking of Buying Agents. They are a novelty over here but if you have deep pockets (I guess you have looking at London) then they may be useful.

Try googling Buying Agents and have a look at Garrington (but others exist). Very few of us use them because we have pretty good local knowledge of the market and tools.

You could also look at my own thread:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/property/4935470-tools-for-house-buyers?page=2&reply=147264362

Good luck