'Millionaire trader' private sales site goes quiet

Hablib, a private sales and rental property site launched in November 2009 by ‘millionaire trader’ Anton Kreil, appears to have failed to achieve lift-off.

Kreil this month unveiled plans to be the first trader to do a financial deal in space.

He launched Hablib as a free site, charging landlords 0% estate agency and letting agent fees.

In fact, it planned to pay the landlords a 50% commission fee direct into their bank account on a monthly basis, for every referral made to the site.

All landlords had to do was register properties, either for sale or rent, and pay nothing for one property or between £204 per year – enough for four listings – and £600, enough for six.

Agents were banned from the site, which was registered with the Property Ombudsman.

Kreil said at the time: “Under the Estate Agents Act, my business is an online estate agent. I spent a year investigating this market and in particular looked at where the Tesco Property website model went wrong – it failed to admit it was an estate agent, despite advice from the OFT.

“We do things that other estate agents do, but the difference is that we have decided to charge 0%.”

Kreil’s business model relied on the power of social networking, and he also said: “I am taking the long-term view. I do not need to make money from the business, but in the fourth year, I plan to take it global.

“This model has never been tried before, but what we are doing is enabling ordinary people to sell and rent their own properties, and using social networking. It is very powerful.”

Kreil claimed: “I know that Rightmove have been looking into social networking. But they can’t do it, because if they did empower home owners to sell their own homes utilising social networking, it would drive away every single one of their member agents.”

However, Hablib does not yet appear to be ready to go global.

The last tweet on Hablib’s twitter account refers to Gordon Brown and is dated April 30, 2010, whilst the Hablib website says it is ‘temporarily unavailable’.

Kreil has been in the news not just because of his space plans, but also because – according to the Sun newspaper – he was recently among guests at a party where bailed-out bankers ‘guzzled free bubbly’ while being entertained by fire-eating strippers.

A TUC spokesman, according to The Sun, accused the revellers of ‘appalling misjudgement’.