The parent company of online auction specialist iamsold has appointed Mark Goddard as its chairman.
Goddard was managing director of ZPG Property Services, and before that was CEO of The Property Software Group.
He will now be group chairman of iamproperty, which has announced a 16% jump in revenue for the first half of this year.
The company’s turnover was £12.6m, up from £0.9m for the same period a year ago.
Iamproperty, which is marking its tenth anniversary, said it now works with 2,500 estate agency branches, and has sold over 16,500 properties since launch.
It is on course to complete 4,000 sales this year for the first time.
Iamsold claims to be the UK’s largest independent residential auctioneer, and to have pioneered the ‘modern method of auction’ which offers buyers a conditional purchase at the fall of the electronic gavel.
Managing director Jamie Cooke said: “Our business is on course for another record-breaking year in terms of revenue and property sales – testimony to the hard work from our entire team.
“As the modern method of auction continues to grow as a category for residential property sales, it’s crucial that we develop and strengthen our market-leading capabilities across technology and compliance and to be at the forefront of industry best practice.
“We are in a strong position to maintain our growth. In the short term we want to expand our offering to estate agents, by giving them a one-stop-shop of modern solutions that help them to provide exceptional customer experiences.”
Newcastle-headquartered iamproperty, which now employs 185 people, received a minority investment from mid-market private equity house LDC earlier this year.
Comments (3)
Great business model but the fees are way over the top for what is involved. Many auctions are now carried out online like ebay so the costs of an auction room are saved; even more money for the service providers. When agents are doing everything necessary to sell a property and can seemingly do it for sub £1000, don’t tell me there is ANY justification for charging a minimum of £5000 + VAT. A £500,000 property (not unknown for MMA) would attract a fee of £17,500, a traditional auctioneer at 1% would receive £5,000. Why the huge difference? As Richard Copus points out above (and has for some time), challenges are ahead for this method of selling.
The buyer has to pay a large fee so that the provider can pay the agent that does the marketing as well as themselves and seduce vendors in instructing them by offering a 0% fee (which means that their legal duty is no longer with the seller, by-the-way but to the buyer). An HGV crash waiting to happen!
Business models like I am sold /Pattinsons/Bamboo etc are great as an add on to your service offering. I not sure why a buyer has to pay an extortionate fee of 3.5% plus VAT. This fee structure will need to change if they want to get mass business.