OnTheMarket has declared StudentCrowd, a student accommodation portal, as being exempt from the new website's only one other portal rule.
Paul Humphreys, co-founder and director of StudentCrowd, has received notification from a sales and marketing executive at the site stating: "I can confirm that whilst your focus in on student accommodation, you are exempt from our rule."
StudentCrowd claims to list more student accommodation in halls of residence and in houses than any other website, and emphasises student property reviews, checking their authenticity through university email addresses.
The exemption from Agents Mutual's 'one property portal' rule came after a number of our customers were contemplating leaving our site out of fear they would break this rule. This could have crippled our fledgling enterprise which relies on income streams from multiple independent letting agents says Humphreys.
However, this is not the first lettings exemption granted by Agents' Mutual, the parent company running OnTheMarket which launches on January 26.
Last year it stated a Scottish rental portal, Citylets, was also exempt and a statement from Agents' Mutual said: Scottish letting agents can benefit from a national and local portals combination which provides sustainable alternatives to the current UK portals.
Comments
Allowing this student lettings website which promotes to agents that they can use the site for FREE just shows again the whole AM drive is to try and turn the clock back 15 years to when high street agents had buyers and sellers all to themselves and they just can't accept that the world have moved on. #settofail
Who do these Tory Bullies think they are
I don't think anyone's suggesting that, but they must have AM/OTM a little bit worried if they've taken this measure.
Anyone who thinks studentcrowd is competition to Rightmove & Zoopla needs their heads examined.
Interesting as the site shows that advertisers can list all their listings from free which no doubt means landlords avoiding agents. Thanks Agents Mutual. definately not doing AM's OnTheMarket when they are hit and missing their one portal rule.
https://www.studentcrowd.com/advertisers
The site shows: Sign up today and advertise all of your listings absolutely free of charge. Once a student finds what they are looking for, the enquiry will land in your inbox without costing you a penny!