How to join the church of latter day ethical estate agents

This gimmick is not just very funny, clever & up-to-date, it actually works as marketing.

http://www.tedtruitt.com/

Having looked at it, you're ready, you're primed & receptive in fact for a really interesting angle on the difficulty estate agents have in terms of their public image.

Unfortunately, what you get in the target website on an ethical code for estate agents is packaged very badly - a failure in terms of marketing/communications - totally over the top, too "clean" & idealised, not direct enough:

http://thecodeisgoodbusiness.com/

Therefore, as a combination, it's a strange juxtaposition of what you might call a European-like, satirical piece of marketing with a classic bit of po-faced American preaching.

Imagine giving out badges to your employees who had shown respect for a code of ethics! They'd laugh in your face & rightly so.

Euphemistic Madness, Propertymonkey to the rescue.

Estate agents have conducted some excellent research over the last ten years or so as house prices have experienced unprecedented growth levels. I always wondering though, how news would be managed if prices began to go downwards instead. This finally started to occur over the last few months. One leading agent/economist describes how “the average price of a second-hand property in Ireland eased back moderately by 1.1% during the first three months of 2007”. Also "House prices eased further in the Dublin second hand market in the first quarter of the year with prices falling back by 2.3%". Correct me if I’m wrong but is “eased back” not a fall, drop or decrease? In conjunction with this we are told that if certain areas are excluded from the analysis, even a slight increase can be detected from the figures. Is there any need to soften a soft landing? Enough of this fluffiness I say, let’s call a spade a spade. Propertymonkey is no fool!

Worth a wager?

With the political parties' promises to abolish or significantly extend stamp duty exemption levels for first time buyers, Paddy Power is offering odds on how the election outcome might impact on non First Timers. 4/6 is being offered on stamp duty being abolished on second hand homes (up to the value of €500,000) while 11/10 is available for those who fancy No.

The mighty Quinn

This image reflects one of the most bizarre phenomena of the Irish property market: that some agents do not include the asking price of the properties they are selling on behalf of their clients in the advertising that those same clients ultimately pay for.

I find it hard to believe that some agents don't record other details of properties: floor area, year of construction, size of plot etc. But PRICE, the damn price they are seeking - how can it be that they wouldn't advertise that? If I'm searching in a particular price range, how am I to know they have properties that match?

What do the clients think? Well, if John Quinn's success in Galway is anything to go by - they are not too bothered. This agent lists about 15% of the properties coming on the market in Galway city, and yet doesn't include prices in either his advertising in the Advertiser or on his website. (He does allow you to search in large price brackets, but is this sufficient?) One of his tag lines on the site is: Galway's New Generation of Estate Agents. Aaaagh!

We're trying to encourage transparency in the market, most recently introducing a way for agents to exchange information on private treaty results, and yet this is what we are up against.

Mr Tayto is not alone

Ph: Paddy 087 **** ***

Just noticed an ad in the Commercial Property supplement of the Irish Independent from last week:

ONE KING sized room, €500 p/m, new house, sky T.V. in room, Ph: Paddy 087 6*4 *6*0

Good luck to you, Paddy, wherever you are!

"The state of the place"

We've been house hunting and sniffing around a particular house a few times now. I won't go into the ins & outs of the house itself, but what's worth commenting on here is the condition the vendors have the house in for selling. It's like they had no intention whatsoever of selling: a complete mess all over. They do have a few excuses - children, packing for the move, a relaxed attitude to housekeeping. But excuses aside, they seem to have completely ignored the advice of the estate agent (who is slightly embarrassed by the state of the place) and all the Tips for Selling they can't have missed down the years.

The funny thing is: it's not really putting us off. There's other things to do that.