A City consultancy's assessment of the new Agents' Mutual portal OnTheMarket claims that "perhaps, like Google, Agents' Mutual is finding that trying to compete with Rightmove and Zoopla is harder than expected."
Jefferies says there are several indicators which it has interpreted as showing "momentum is waning" for the new portal which launches on January 26.
One is that the time frame for agents to sign up for Gold membership has been extended to January 2015, whereas the old deadline was October this year.
Another is that whereas Gold members previously had to provide a £2,000 loan note (or £1,000 for a lettings-only branch) this has been reduced across the board to £1,000 per branch (and £500 for lettings-only).
A third indicator is that previous claims of £10m "contracted revenue" have neither been repeated nor updated in recent marketing by Agents' Mutual "which suggests to us that it is not quite as high as they would like."
A fourth indicator is that there is an alleged lack of transparency over how many 'letters of intent' by agents have been converted into contracts. "We suspect if there was good news on this front, Agents' Mutual would be shouting about it by now" says the Jefferies analysts.
In the light of a slowing housing market, the four analysts who compiled Jefferies' latest assessment conclude that "now is not the time, in our view, for agents to sever ties with the most powerful tried and tested routes to market, for an untried and untested alternative."
Comments
I sound old now but iam 38... i remember spineless agents supporting rightmove and thats what made them strong. I ve never been on it and we are 3rd in our city. I CANT wait for ONTHE MARKET!!! Remember,,buyers will find the website with the most houses on it...just like b4 we had the stupid internet and buyers found a house by a board or newspaper. shhhh they still do!!!
I think Ben is Simon Shinerock in disguise.
@PropertyPundit I will respond to your initial question, as the rest of your comment is just inflammatory nonsense.
No, I wouldnt expect any vendor to instruct me based purely on portal coverage, but you know that because I didnt even remotely suggest it. However, they WILL ask you why you are dropping one of the two nationally known portals in favour of a portal that is completely unknown outside the world of estate agency. Why will they ask Because every other agent worth their salt is going to point it out to them; apart from the fact that it lowers your own overheads at the expense of their propertys exposure, what reason will you give
Now, as a London agent I will concede that our market is very different to that in Yorkshire, for example. Considering Central/East London is one of Zooplas strongest areas, and given the level of competition between agents here, I doubt many would dare touch AMs exclusivity agreement with a barge-pole but if any do, they wont stand a chance when going up against even a half-decent valuer.
On day 1, it looks like On the Market will have circa 80% of all properties in the West of Scotland on their Portal, while today Rightmove only has about 65%!
@Ben So you believe vendors will choose you purely down to your choice of portals Wow, you must be such a good valuer that you don't need to 'sell' yourself or your company's services and reputation (assuming it has one). Tell me now that you don't cut fees either.
DOA comes to mind
What about the notion that Onthemarket.com will offer a far superior search platform, exceed zoopla with number of listings due to the fact that a large proportion of agents will cancel zoopla under the 'one other portal rule' and finally the fact that the corporate agents with a minority market share vs independent agent will be not be able to promote their properties at onthemarket.com. By the way this company in the article has vested interest in zoopla... Suprise suprise
Shocking the impartial news website whose owner has a stake in Zoopla thinks that Agents Mutual will fail. This site isn't news its paid for advertising wrapped up as news!
A little bird migrating for the winter became exhausted in a storm and fell from the sky. By good fortune she fell into a farmers field and a passing cow happen to poop right on top of her. The warm fresh cow pat revived the little bird and she poked her head out of the pat just as the clouds parted and the sun came dazzling through. The little birds heart filled with joy and she began to sing, attracting the attention of a passing fox who pulled her out of the the cow pat and ate her. There are several morals to this story, first, just because someone shits on you doesnt mean they are your enemy, second, just because someone pulls you out of the shit doesn't mean they are you're friend and finally, if you are in the shit and happy, keep quiet about it.
Far reaching insight by NWAgent.
This is going to turn into a civil war. It's like the posh and brainless against the business and canny.
The other thing AM forget is that the press always take the perspective of the consumer - and rightly so!
Why would sellers expect their properties to be on websites they have never heard of Go into the centre of your town and canvass how many property portals passers by can name. If they get more than 1 per person I would be surprised.
I keep reading AM agents saying that vendors never ask which portals an EA is on.
That's like a garage saying car owners never ask if a service includes an oil change.
The fact is most sellers will just expect/take it for granted that their EA is listing their property on RM/Z and when - as NWAgent rightly points out - they find out from non AM EA's + from the negative media publicity that will inevitably follow - AM agents will sharp find out how bothered sellers are.
The fact is AM agents have absolutely NO reason to justify listing a sellers property on OTM other than RM/Z are too expensive - who cares Only the EA. Whereas non AM EA's will counter with "we are staying with RM/Z because we put your Mr/Mrs Seller interests in being on nationally known brand name portals visited by millions of buyers every month above our interests in saving a couple of hundred quid a month by sticking you on an unknown, untested website with an unknown number of buyers". Any AM EA who seriously believes that non AM EA's won't be hammering home that line to AM EA's existing clients and potential new clients is in for a rough time.
AM will, with their one other portal rule, create the equivalent of a civil war among EA's with plenty non EA's lining up to tell local and national media how bad OTM is for sellers. This issue is going to get very nasty very quickly.
Providing nothing to the consumer + low marketing budget = another failed portal.
I think that it is safe to say that Estate Agent Today has firmly nailed its colours to the mast on a conflict of interest vs objective news.
[quote]In all seriousness how many potential vendors ask you to list every web site / portal you're on [/quote]
David, I think while this may not currently be an issue for you, once AM launches agents will begin bringing to vendors' attention that those they are going up against on an instruction are "using their vendors' homes to promote a new portal that serves to pad their own pockets."
This will become a much bigger issue very quickly, because those agents not joining AM will see to it that it does.
In all seriousness how many potential vendors ask you to list every web site / portal you're on If you are the new guys on the block maybe but established and obviously selling this is not a question we come across. Most of them are looking for property locally and as long as you are on one of the 2 largest and they've seen your listings then not a problem.
Jeffries advised Zoopla on their market float. Nervous now it would seem issuing another note.
Methinks the lady doth protest too much.
Good to see EAT disclose Jeffries interest in this affair.
I really cannot wait to go up against an AM agent on a valuation. It's going to be like candy from a baby.
How can they not see this
OTM's USP's are aimed entirely at agents.
"Hello Mr Vendor, I'm on this great new portal you've never heard of, we dropped Rightmove/Zoopla (delete as appropriate) because they were charging us way too much money. Anyway my fee to you is going to be 5,000 + VAT. Just sign here. Sir Why are you laughing"
It won't end well.