We continue our series of summer interviews with this chat with John Tighe, the man behind interesting, unorthodox online estate agency House Hop. Read on for John's take on launching an agency business while transactions are low, outstanding customer service and a very nice estate agent joke.
John, I was wondering if you could say something about your background? Is it in property, sales, technology? And how/when did you start work on HouseHop?
Actually, my background is in law. Before founding House Hop I worked in the City as a corporate lawyer. Then, in mid-2008, I lost my job. The outlook (and hence job prospects) in the City went from bad to worse during the course of 2008 with the UK officially going into recession and September seeing the collapse of Lehmans, the AIG bailout, and the Lloyds takeover of HBOS.
By December I was pretty frustrated to say the least. I remember thinking to myself “I can’t do another six months like this” – especially since there was no obvious end to the country’s economic problems.
That’s when I decided to launch House Hop. I’d always wanted to start a business and I figured I really had nothing to lose! Plus, it was a way of taking back some control over my life.
As one of Lord Sugar’s obnoxious pals might say… what’s the elevator pitch? What makes HouseHop unique when there are other online estate agencies around?
Read the rest of the interview by clicking here.
House Hop’s aim is to stand out from other online estate agents in two key ways: first, in the value we add to the transaction; second, in the level of customer service we provide.
To add value we provide a comprehensive package and stay highly involved in the sale process – for us, it’s not about just giving people access to property portals.
Our approach to customer service is that we want to be outstanding. We want to “Wow” our clients with our responsiveness and our willingness to get things done for them. And if we get things wrong we do everything we can to fix them.
(Ok, that comes in at under 30 seconds so it still counts as an elevator pitch!)
You offer two ranges of service, and different packages within each range. The main decision appears to be whether to go with a “private sale” model or an “online estate agent” model. The advantages of the second appear to be wider advertising?
That’s right. Originally, we started out as a private sale site. The problem with private sale is that the major portals have banned private sellers.
And while private sale can work, it’s really hard without exposure to that critical mass of buyers, especially in this market. We weren’t getting the level of success we were hoping for, so we decided to reinvent ourselves as an online estate agency at the start of this year.
We’re now finding that the majority of our clients are opting for online estate agency (rather than private sale) because they can clearly see the value of getting in front of so many more buyers.
Some of the more expensive packages offer help with valuation, even negotiation. How does this work in practice?
Much in the same way as it would with a traditional high street agent. For valuations we look at all the comparables that are available as well as market trends for that area. Then we discuss things with the client and the local agent who prepares the listing. And of course we monitor the response to see if we’ve got things right.
As for negotiation, the leads from the property portals all come straight to us so we’re in contact with both buyers and sellers. Unless a client tells us they’d prefer to do the negotiations themselves we take it upon ourselves to be involved as a matter of course. Conducting a viewing is easy for most sellers, but having a third party negotiate for you is an area we can add real value.
How do you see the current market as a launch climate? When you began working on the project did you expect to be launching into such a slow property market?
Ha! Well, I refer you back to my answer to the first question! I knew it was going to be tougher with transaction volumes down so much, both compared to peak and to the long term average.
However, I felt if I could make it work in this climate the company would be pretty well set. And we seem to have made it work, though it’s been a hard slog!
Is there room for a number of online agencies to co-exist, or is this the beginning of a long struggle for dominance. Is there the opportunity for an “Amazon” of online property selling to clean up?
The OFT published a report last year on competition in the UK residential property market. Their figures showed that online estate agents had just a 2 per cent market share, so I don’t think we’re likely to reach saturation point just yet.
Having said that, it’s perfectly possible an online estate agent may come to dominate that sector of the market. If it happens, though, I doubt it will be price and choice based like Amazon since there are only so many fee options you can offer and there’s pretty fierce price competition already. It could happen through brand awareness.
It’s traditional at the end of a Rat and Mouse interview to finish with an estate agent joke. If you’ve a favourite, please feel free to share. (But it’s not compulsory.)
Two small boys, were chatting on their first day at school:
“My name’s Tom. What's yours?” asked the first boy.
“Billy” replied the second.
“My Dad's an accountant. What does yours do?” asked Tom.
“My Dad's an estate agent” Billy replied.
“Honest?” said Tom.
“No, just the regular kind.”
Thanks, John, for your time. It’s very much appreciated.
Visit House Hop here.
