New site will be free until mid 2010

Guy Walker, chief executive of FindsYou, the innovative new online property service aimed at passing leads to agents, says it will be free until at least half way through 2010.

“That is our current intention,” he said. “We did not want to charge for something that, as far as agents are concerned, is new and untested, and would have involved a leap of faith. We do not feel it right to charge until we are genuinely adding value. And even when we do charge, it will be cost effective, at under £10 per month per branch.

“We feel that by mid-2010 we will have proved ourselves and there will be no reason for agents not to belong to the site.”

FindsYou does not list properties. Instead, it asks agents and property-hunters to register – a process that takes no more than 30 seconds.

Property hunters can then post their requirements, whether for sales or lettings. An automated email is then sent to the agents in that particular location who might have matching, or near-matching, properties. At the click of a button, they can then access the consumer’s contact details.

“We basically decided to turn the whole internet property portal model on its head,” said Walker, whose business partner is chairman Adrian Cox, former European chief executive of Ask Jeeves.

“We have spent two years in developing the site, which we want to be as simple and automated as possible for both agents and consumers.

“We will not allow private sales, and we won’t bombard agents with spam or advertisements. We are simply hoping to get as many of them using our site as possible.”

The site has already attracted well over 1,000 agency branches, largely by word of mouth, and also through co-advertising on Nethouseprices.