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Hybrid estate agency The Home Seller, which earlier this year publicly-endorsed Agents' Mutual, says it is now against the portal because of its opposition to online agents and what it believes may be technical limitations on how properties may be advertised.

Luke Power, managing director of the The Home Sellers, says he represented his Cornish-based agency at a meeting arranged by Agents' Mutual earlier this year. Despite initial scepticism at AM's ability to challenge existing portals Rightmove and Zoopla, he came away convinced of its likely success for two reasons.

Firstly that the group have already raised a significant amount of investment, £7m as far as I am aware. Secondly because Agents' Mutual are asking agents to ditch one of either Rightmove or Zoopla says Power in a blog just posted to his agency's site.

He went on to argue the case for Agents' Mutual, tweeting after the meeting that very interesting & solid presentation, thank you. A room full of fear, determination & excitement!.

However, Power now claims to have gone full circle for two reasons.

The first is that he says he wanted to register with Agents' Mutual but could not because - although he offers what he calls personal service, presenter-led film tours [and] tailored marketing - he could not join AM because he did not operate a traditional high street office and so did not meet the new portal's rule allowing only bona fide full service office-based sales or letting agents. Power claims this removes choice from consumers.

His second reason for opposing AM is that his firm has produced video tours - for other agents as well as his own - and regards these as useful for selling properties and winning internet rankings. However, Power says Agents' Mutual has not been able to say whether video will be able to be embedded in property listings.

Power ends his blog by saying that his initial view of Agents' Mutual - which launches next year as On The Market - may have been correct, and that it is another old boys' club which, although showing good signs of disrupting the market, will actually be held back by their inability to really innovate and, crucially, deliver a website that the consumer will have any interest in.

Comments

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    Bumper news day for Agents' Mutual. Still think it's a silly move for them to oppose online agents - too narrow-minded in my opinion.

    • 11 September 2014 09:23 AM
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