It is said there are lies, damned lies, and statistics.
As the General Election draws nearer and we head for political exhaustion long before Polling Day on May 7, this old saying will ring true many times over.
But that doesn't means statistics and surveys can be ignored, just tempered by a touch of realism.
The Property Academy Home Moving Trends Survey for 2014 asked 4,506 people about their decisions. The majority of respondents were female (the split was 58 per cent / 42 per cent) and their ages were roughly equally divided among four groups ranging from 30-39 through to 60-69.
What was interesting was that only one per cent claimed to have been influenced in their choice of agent asked to provide a valuation by whether the agent belonged to a professional body.
It's a figure that should have set alarm bells ringing at the NFoPP headquarters in Warwick. I'm a Fellow of both its constituent bodies, NAEA and ARLA, and have long believed they are a force for good.
Another interesting figure from the Property Academy report is that 20 per cent of people were influenced in their choice of agent by the agent's reputation, the biggest single influencing factor.
To me, reputation and professionalism go hand in hand because to have a good rating for the first you have to be highly accomplished in the second. This is where NFoPP's constituent parts may be falling down for the industry because the raising of standards through membership is not put in the media spotlight often enough.
It should be telling people that its member agents are encouraged to obtain professional qualifications that bring better standards and that, with Client Money Protection in place, consumers who use its members stand a far higher chance of getting their money back when things go awry.
I also think that membership of local property associations, and connection with fellow professionals in residential sales and lettings such as lawyers, conveyancers, and surveyors, is also important because it leads to the type of joined-up thinking that can make the consumer experience better. Likewise, redress schemes, although we now have a confusing proliferation, are great for consumers and therefore for agents if we can be bothered to promote membership.
Back in 2005, I took my then firm into the Ombudsman for Estate Agents scheme, now The Property Ombudsman, to become the 1,000th member firm. This year, TPO as the successor organisation, is 25 years old and the current Ombudsman, Christopher Hamer, has probably done more to raise industry standards than any other individual since he took office.
I think we all need to be proud of our professional bodies and promote them to our clients, explain what they mean, and what they bring to the industry by way of improved standards. Perhaps they will then rate better in such surveys and, more importantly, influence industry behaviour but it's a long climb!
*Colin Shairp is Director of Fine and Country Southern Hampshire
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