Purple Bricks 🧐

[HmmmmmmInteresting]

Is it me, or are they just shite?

They are indeed.

They're shite. I don't think we'd have bought a house if it was listed there as they don't help to complete a sale, only to get to an offer being accepted.

I hesitate when I see a house listed with them. Hate the booking system, hate their offer system, hate the fact the viewing agent knows less than nothing about the property.

When I bought my last house they were the agent selling the house my vendor was buying, and they were the ones holding up the whole chain all the way through.

Currently trying to buy a house off a vendor listed with them and they're acting like I'm an inconvenience. Their booking system doesn't work properly and the 'local property expert' is less than useless. The estate agents I'm using for my house couldn't be more different: super- motivated and a pleasure to deal with. It's honestly putting me off the property, even though I loved it to start with.

My kids are like 'mum! Don't let your heart rule your head- we love this house' . But FFS, buying a house is stressful enough, there's no need to introduce clowns into the equation

Awful! Been trying to book a property viewing for about 3 weeks now. Don't understand why diary indicates availability when the agent seems to have none! If it wasn't the only one we've seen that meets our criteria we'd have given up.

But seriously, a property is usually your biggest asset, why would you mess around with the third rate option, can't understand it.

I have opted for an online EA, however did my homework, comparing all of them.
I went for less known one(less busy), hence I received a great service and saved my self 8k.
PB downside is they are so busy, you get neglected and ignored.
still believe online agency is the way forward.

But seriously, a property is usually your biggest asset, why would you mess around with the third rate option, can't understand it.

They're not even that cheap to make up for the crap service! But I think maybe the vendors don't realise how bad they are. They won't know that I've been trying to book viewings and failing, despite speaking to their 'local property expert' 🙄

@mumsy27

I have opted for an online EA, however did my homework, comparing all of them. I went for less known one(less busy), hence I received a great service and saved my self 8k. PB downside is they are so busy, you get neglected and ignored. still believe online agency is the way forward.

Don't get me wrong, I've used an online agent before that cost £199 me to sell my house. I was so impressed with what I got for my money.

Yeah they are pure shite

Purple Bricks are cheap but will they get you the best selling price? And how hands on are they?
You have to arrange viewings yourself via the online messaging thing. I remember trying to book a viewing for a house that was up for sale with Purple Bricks and gave up in the end because trying to arrange it with the vendor ending up being a massive faff.

When we sold our house recently our estate agent held an open day.
They booked in 16 viewings on the Sunday and several more for the Monday and Tuesday. It went to best offers and by the deadline on the Friday we had received 10 offers. The best was 66k over asking price. We moved house just 12 weeks later. They played an absolute blinder.

Could Purple Bricks do this?

I think a lot depends where you are. For us in London it worked fine...viewers incl. buyers were nearly all young couples and not fazed by the online stuff. So...use again? In the sticks absolutely hopeless, only one viewing and didn't realise the aversion to viewings through them (thanks MN posts) which I understand having done viewings of PB sellers.

Don't get me started on purple bricks 😡

I actually think if you're the vendor they're probably great, you save a load of money. If we'd used them it would've been £1500 rather than 6k.
We had them as the buyer. Up to the point of getting our offer accepted, they were great. But then they were absolutely terrible. The post sales team have absolutely no idea what is happening and are entirely reactive.

We're currently using a lady who has started a new business in the area. She's a one person team and so far she is brilliant!

Yes they are. I tried to book multiple property viewings (4) with them when we were house hunting and they didn't get back to me about any of them! We stopped even trying to view any that were being sold by PB after that, we'd just discount them immediately!

Said this before but as a buyer they are crap. It shouldn’t be hard work trying to book a viewing on a house you want to buy. I think if a house is up with purple bricks that the process is going to be a pain in the arse so stopped bothering looking at houses with them when we were looking. The house we bought was an online agent and even that was much more difficult as a buyer than dealing with a local agent.

rhymes with pr...

says it all

We bought ours through them and I thought they were great! But I loathe estate agents so having no contact with one is a bonus for me.

Speaking from experience selling with an online agent (yopa) TWICE (first time we sold we lost the house we were buying, and so our buyer too, due to not wanting to wait for us to find a property last year)

Both times we ended up selling through a highstreet agent instead and for better prices than offered through yopa. First time we were up for 2 months with YOPA with no offer in sight. Went up with highstreet agent and sold within 2 weeks. This time we were up with YOPA for a month and did have 2 offers (after 10 viewings) but neither went as high as we liked. We went up with a new highstreet agent and after 4 days got us a much higher offer after just 1 viewing!

The online agents were timely and replied to queries we asked quickly, i will say that about them, but i dont think they have the same skills as a normal agent. They literally just open doors. Their feedback was poor too, so never really knew how to improve after each viewing rejection.

We are just starting to look to buy our first house and I already have PB. Two houses I've tried to book viewings with and I've given up already. The website is glitchy and doesn't work properly. One vendor messaged me in response to a viewing request to say they would need to arrange a time with the tenants and then never got back to me. The other one, the 'property expert' won't respond to any messages just keeps moving the appointment time to a time I've already said I cannot do and rejected my 3 other date/time requests. Given up and am unlikely to bother to try and view any more PB properties, what a faff.

@MeadowHay

We are just starting to look to buy our first house and I already have PB. Two houses I've tried to book viewings with and I've given up already. The website is glitchy and doesn't work properly. One vendor messaged me in response to a viewing request to say they would need to arrange a time with the tenants and then never got back to me. The other one, the 'property expert' won't respond to any messages just keeps moving the appointment time to a time I've already said I cannot do and rejected my 3 other date/time requests. Given up and am unlikely to bother to try and view any more PB properties, what a faff.

Agree with everything you've just said here!

I'm actually fuming, it's so frustrating

We've bought through them twice. First time was v straightforward, we were first time buyers and there was no onward chain etc. Lovely.

Most recently, dear god the stress. Woman that showed us round the house couldn't answer any of our questions, seemed almost put out that we asked things like, how old it the boiler? The vendor had issues with their onward purchase and we spent SO MUCH TIME chasing PB to get an update on what the hell was going on and they have no idea, because post sales support is a pile of crap!!

So yes, they're shite. I've not helped in any way, just venting my own annoyance

From a seller's perspective - we tried to sell our house via Purple Bricks, local agent came round and was impressive so we signed (paid upfront, didn't want to pay later and have to use their solicitors).A week later the guy had left the company and a woman took over.
She was utterly useless, took crap photos and was uncontactable. She took ages to respond to emails, phone calls always went to voicemail, no replies. I complained to her regional office.
She then told me very nastily that she hadn't seen my emails because i had wrongly sent them to her personal email address not the work one, (the personal address which she had in fact used in an early email to me and hence which came up automatically when i replied). After that the relationship broke down completely and I ended the contract.
But she did absolutely nothing to help sell the house, I rewrote her pedestrian and misleading blurb, the photos were dire, (automated viewings went ok) and she was simply never around.
We asked if we should reduce it, she basically shrugged and said it was up to us.
We put it on with a local EA who took amazing photos and advised the price was too high, we reduced it and it sold. Cost us more but a much better service. You get what you pay for.

I wouldn't use them where there was a chain or any likely complications. EAs have been crucial in holding chains together, advising on reputable companies to provide extra reports demanded by lenders etc. PB was so hopeless at communicating over almost everything I wouldn't want them involved, tbh.

I stopped viewing properties marketed through PB, it was such a hassle.