Estate Agents not on Rightmove

“Are there any estate agents, not on rightmove ? 

The answer is YES.

However, to answer this question in full, I will outline property searching and how it works.

Housing Stock

Over 90% of UK housing stock is sold through estate agents. (The remaining properties are sold ‘off market’, or to ‘family and friends’, or privately.)

Why are Estate Agents so popular with buyers? 

1. its free to use an estate agent.
2. As a buyer, you want to find the very best property you can. Therefore, you head to where the stock is. “Thee who has the stock, has the audience.” 

Historically estate agents had the stock and as a buyer, it was time consuming and hard work to contact the fifty agents.

Why is Rightmove so popular? 

rightmove (currently) has market share. There are more properties available for sale on Rightmove, than any other source or website. “Thee who has the stock, has the audience.”

So, as a buyer, rather than having to contact all fifty agents, now all these agents advertise on Rightmove, and as a buyer, its convenient and time saving, to search the whole property market in one place.

Its also very popular with estate agents due to being able to access behind the scenes data and with users being able to search house prices in Bournemouth

Does rightmove have EVERY property? or could I be missing out? 

As a buyer, looking for a home, this is ideal. As a buyer, looking for a buy to let investment property, its handy to know any agents not on Rightmove as the seller will not have the enquiries or demand from buyers, and therefore could possibly accept a lower price.

I can confirm in London or other towns, half the agents can be on OnTheMarket, or Zoopla

TIP– The same agents, with the same stock list on zoopla and primelocation, its exactly the same.

IN BOURNEMOUTH  (today January 2019)

• There are 124 Estate Agents in Bournemouth on rightmove
• There are 65 Estate Agents listing OnTheMarket – all independent (of which 2 are not on rightmove)
• There are 59 Estate Agents on Zoopla / Primelocation – mainly corporate and Zoopla are still listing an estate agent that went bust a year ago and there are quite a few ‘online advertisers / online estate agents’ (not not real estate agents)

So, on review, at this moment in time, without question in Bournemouth, I would be sticking to Rightmove to buy or sell a property.

Will this change?

YES, is the likely answer. Rightmove increase the fees they charge to estate agents yearly. It costs one branch well over a thousand pound a month to advertise on rightmove AND is going up. There is a limit.

History of Rightmove

Rightmove started in 1999 / 2000 by several large estate agents, Halifax, Countrywide, Connells & Royal Sun Alliance and they recognised the internet would change the way people search for property, essentially to make the process easier. They also controlled a large market share to make this work, although, rightmove nearly went bust in the earlier days, when it was free to advertise and without the independent estate agents, it would have folded. I even remember the conversation “its better, we as agents start the biggest ‘one stop shop’ for users to search for property, than someone outside the industry holding us to ransom.” Ironic, these agents then listed the company on the London stock market, making these companies millions and now have a company holding agents ransom.” However, for the first time, a home buyer could now go to one point and access the full property market. No need to visit fifty websites or different offices, the convenience for all concerned has made the process much easier and is one of the ingredients to house prices increases from 1999 through the next decade. A large number of buyers, all accessing the same point creating greater demand.

History of OnTheMarket

This started as a mutual three years ago, run and owned by the members, it was brilliant. A portal the agents owned, for the agents, by the agents. Unfortunately, a year ago, they also listed on the London stock market. At least the member agents did benefit from this listing but in my view, its badly operated and I think it unlikely this business will last.

Although, they do have a fantastic USP – my phrase: “Thee who has the stock, has the audience.” can be changed too “Thee who has the stock FIRST, has the audience.”

OnTheMarket have ‘new and exclusive’ properties. These are new instructions, advertised 24 to 48 hours prior to other property portals. As a buyer or tenant, there is good reason to set up an alert on this property site – as they say “the early bird catches the worm”.

History of zoopla

The property searching business was dominated by two sites, Rightmove and Zoopla and Zoopla has grown by buying competitors, like primelocation, to become a big player in the marketplace. Its aggressive to its customers, namely the agents but has been very innovative and has kept on the acquisition plan, acquiring estate agents software providers and ancillary services and using this data, to grow and develop the business.

Buy to let investment properties

With so many eagle eyes on Rightmove, its no surprise people are also searching for estate agents not on rightmove to try and find properties not well advertised, therefore lower demand, selling at lower prices.

Certainty, sellers have always had the opportunity to advertise privately, in the free-ads for example, although they were rarely successful unless they heavily reduced the price. its false economy. However, now, private sellers can advertise on gumtree or other websites, but again, demand is lower and therefore there is a chance to buy a bargain. Be careful, with some of the online estate agents, Emoov who bought Sarah Beeney Tepilo became insolvent and other online estate agents, many of whom charge upfront fees or buy now, pay later have gone bust.

Are Estate Agents not on Rightmove Safe? 

Yes. In some parts of the country, Zoopla or OntheMarket are king pin and have market share.

In Bournemouth, its rightmove, but the day for reckoning is near. As the price for rightmove increases each year, many more agents will stop using rightmove. This will ultimately be bad for the end user, but the yearly price increases are unsustainable.

As an Independent Estate Agent in Bournemouth

Both my parents were estate agents, since 1972 and if you think of ‘open all hours’, my home was an estate agents office. We lived behind and above. The whole house rang when the office phone rang and the bells rang when someone came in. I remember clearly my first recession in 1989, I was 13 years old and it was a hard 4 year recession, money was not just tight, it was non-excistant. I opened my own agency in 2005, with the credit crunch in 2008 which was hard but at least it was only one year.

As an independent agent, I’ve become more aware of how valuable the data and listings are and early bird access.

Today, we do not advertise all the properties listed with us immediately on property portals and instead promote the properties, especially in sought after areas or high demand to our database first.

If not sold, we then advertise online a few days or week later. Certainly, if I call a potential buyer and say, “we have a property that meets your criteria and I am calling you before its made available before Rightmove or online, therefore, you need to view today”. It creates exclusivity and many people will pay a premium to find the right property, thereby achieving the seller a good price and ideal home for the buyer, a win, win.

Our new and exclusive Rent to Own Service

We also offer our Rent to Own service. These properties are advertised to tenants who want to be home owners and for landlords looking to sell their property. These properties are not normally advertised on Rightmove or other property portals and are exclusively advertised on CLIFFTONS

Many of the online only adverts, which they call themselves ‘online estate agents’ do not advertise on Rightmove, due to the cost but I would say, Rightmove is market leader for a reason.

If selling or renting a property, this is where you need to be as a minimum.

18% of our enquiries are still walk in enquiries into our offices, and receive enquiries from newspapers and magazines, boards, google, our national network, referrals etc, but rightmove is a great source of enquiries.

Take the next step, find a property for sale in Bournemouth and Poole.

Thank you and happy searching.