Member Info for cyberduck

I don't think other online agents will compete with PB until they spend as much (or probably more) on marketing. You see PB boards everywhere you go but I can count the number of Yopa boards I've seen on 2 fingers. Could be wrong. I must admit I always thought PB would offer a no sale no fee product at some point and I don't think this goes against their philosophy which has always been against charging a percentage of the property value as commission. I think they could even offer a novel addon to what they currently have which would be a money back guarantee provided the owner lists at a price recommended by their LPE. They wouldn't get all the time wasters then.

Not seeing any slowdown in listings by PB which I think you'd expect to see if the public were concerned by the claims made in the Jefferies report. Market share gradually increasing according to my proxy. For new listings up from 3.38% on 7th January to 4.03% yesterday. Do your own research.

>One peep at the myriad of changes up and down is going to deter the most ardent of buyers in trying to do business with this seller ! No arguments there. It's hard to work out what's going on with their thinking.

Sain, For somebody who has been watching the market it will be noticeable but for somebody new to the market they won't likely know so if you aren't getting any interest it's worth taking it off the market and popping it back on every 3 months or so just to see if somebody new is out there. When I was selling my house I listed high because there wasn't anything really similar to mine on the market at the time. Then a property that had fallen through came back on the market and it was obvious to me that mine was suddenly the less attractive of the two. I lowered my price but equally i could have taken mine off and waited for the other one to sell. I just think there will be different types of seller attracted to PurpleBricks. Some will like the fact it's a once only fee with multiple chances to sell. When I was doing my research into the allegations of portal juggling I saw one property that came back on the market and I looked a little deeper and it had been rented out shortly after being listed for sale the first time so the landlord had listed it for sale & rent at the same time and when he found a tenant took it off the market.

>Anybody who pays an agency a fee regardless of a sale occurring is more likely to be a motivated seller so they should have a better conversion rate than no sale no fee Whilst you aren't going to get time-wasters you are probably going to get people who think they know better than the traditional agent about valuation and go with an online agent because they can use the online system to play around with the price, take it off the market, then bring it back on in January. Not everybody is desperate to sell quickly and a re prepared to wait for the right buyer to come along.

Well here's the post sales charter https://www.purplebricks.co.uk/terms/post-sale-charter It will only be a matter of days to see if the latest bad publicity has hit sales. Previous bad publicity such as the Watchdog report didn't have any effect but let's wait and see.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09qdc1r

Thanks 305020, There's no doubt PB work with you beyond the point of payment. However even if there has to be a change of accounting I don't see it as a big problem. The shares are pretty much valued with a large amount of future success factored in anyway so I don't see that being too much of an issue. With PB much of the ongoing support is actually automated including the implementation of marketing breaks - you simply use the platform so perhaps it's open to interpretation. As for your point about the win/lose at the flip of a coin argument . We'll have to see whether those selling that fiction can overcome the mighty marketing machine of PB. When it comes to spin, PB are no mugs :) Of course the other side of the coin (sorry!) is that there must be a lot of poorly performing traditional agents out there, probably on the verge of going under who have just lost the ability to sell themselves as a superior service. There are also a lot of property owners like bandit1 who are looking at paying �845, know the value of their property, think or know that they can do as well as a high street agent at selling it and stand to save thousands if they do. I'm not convinced this report is all bad news for PB as it opens up the High Street to an extent. PB currently have a market share of about 4% of new listings which is tiny considering the brand recognition. Perhaps those who have seen but been cautious because they didn't believe PB could do as well as the High Street will now start looking at the savings they can make. Yes, there is a price point where the risk/reward is equal but let's ignore the spin for a minute and look at Foxtons who charge 3% commission, then you've got the average price property in London at �450K and the �1200 PB fee. Surely this is worth paying when you are looking at giving them �13.5K? Then you've got bigger rewards for a 50/50 chance on all above average price properties in London and even a large number of properties throughout the country. It's still early days and I suspect there's a long way to go before you can write them off. In the meantime traders will relish the share price volatility :)

305020, Can you explain what you think the issue is with revenue recognition? Is it not just a matter of clarifying the policy or is there some law regarding this? You can understand a commission based model requiring recognition on completion because that is when the fees are due, however PB expect the payment immediately unless you opt for the payment deferral in which case PB still receive the payment immediately but not from the customer. Is this not just mischief making? The same way that average income per instruction is being bandied about as though it equates to average fees paid by the customer? Everybody knows that PB earn commission when the sale completes and there may well be other elements in the average income per instruction amount. Likewise continually referring to a conversion rate of 88% because this was once upon a time claimed on a live radio interview, yet there have been several updates since this and no time-frame was ever given anyway. When people stoop to such desperate levels it's hard taking anything they say seriously.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/02/02/online-estate-agency-purplebricks-denies-hiding-true-sales-figures/ 'Mr Wainwright added that Purplebricks was "shaking up the traditional estate agent industry" that Jefferies represents, noting the investment firm does work for rivals Countrywide and LSL. "They're not providing independent research: they don't do the same reports on their clients as they do on us," he said. He added that none of Purplebricks' rivals shared data on how many sales they had completed. "Our competitors goading us to share a number that they don�t share isn�t something we�ll rise to," he said.'

Going back to March 2017 Jefferies produced an industry note which stated "we have details of every property listed for sale on Rightmove by the main corporate agents (both hybrid and traditional) since the beginning of November 2016. We are tracking the performance of each property and later in the year hope to report the efficiency and effectiveness of each agent". In that industry note they appeared to be focusing on Countrywide, LSL, Foxtons and PurpleBricks who are of course the biggest players. It seems odd that they have now come out with this report rather than one comparing the big 4. Perhaps this is because PurpleBricks have a better listing to completion ratio? Perhaps not, but it seems very strange that they now just focus on PurpleBricks. Of course Jefferies are broker to Countrywide and their recent problems are well documented. There seems to be some mainstream media coverage resulting from the Jefferies report. It will be interesting to see what they have to say. On Sunday there's something on BBC 5 live and they're asking for people's experience with PB. http://www.bbc.com/news/business-42915433. Given that people are far more likely to complain about a negative experience than give praise about a positive one I suspect this could be another blow for PB.

A while back they were suggesting 14% conversion. https://www.estateagenttoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2016/7/purplebricks-blasted-over-sales-totals-and-speed-of-completions This article makes interesting reading in regard to their role as Countrywide Broker. https://aimgroup.com/2017/08/23/in-the-uk-transparency-and-bias-affect-estate-agency-disruption/

Not sure what the issue is. Did anybody expect them to have a conversion rate better than the top agents? The big shock is that traditional agents are so bad. They run around like blue ar*ed flies, phoning you up, bombarding you with emails and they can't even do better on average than a budget operation. Just shows what a ripoff traditional Estate Agents are. Taking a percentage of the value of your asset to sell your house and being as quiet as possible in regard to how much they charge you, then charging those less able to negotiate a higher rate.

goodbyeZPLA, the latest news is that the High Street has a similar conversion rate. See https://www.estateagenttoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2018/2/purplebricks-sells-51-6-of-homes-within-10-months-new-analysis-shows 'Jefferies analysed the stock the agency took on board in November 2016 and in a note to investors it says the 51.6 per cent sales proportion is �a similar success rate to the overall market.�'

According to the report from Jefferies, broker for Countrywide, they have a similar success rate to the overall market. So traditional agents charge more and cannot demonstrate a better performance. I've been listening to traditional agents trying to say that PB are just a passive intermediary for the last 12 months, so this must be extremely embarrassing for them if they only achieve the same results after all the claims of being better.

https://www.standard.co.uk/business/housebuilders-reject-sajid-javid-claims-of-delaying-construction-a3754171.html

James, 70 reservations & 2 on hold. Info. from JLL International.

If TEF manage to forward sell 60% or more of NGQ in this environment, it sends a very strong message of endorsement I think. In 2016 they forward sold 70% of Liberty Building. It's looking good so far with UK sales and the investors who we have been told are no longer out there. Now we need to see if Asians still want to invest. Again looking back to the Liberty Building, Asians reserved twice as many as the UK investors did.

Looks very much like a bear market when it comes to housebuilders. I'm hoping TEF protects us from the worst of it with a stream of good news that can't be interpreted negatively :)

Planning Decision next month. https://www.homesandproperty.co.uk/property-news/buying/new-homes/call-the-midwife-location-poplar-will-see-drastic-change-with-billions-of-pounds-of-investment-and-a117096.html