A new national agency is getting set to launch with ambitions to be a lettings-only version of Purplebricks.

The new business, called Accommodation, will use self-employed Local Lettings Experts across the country, who will be able to use centralised technology, build up their own businesses and make their own hires.

Accommodation is set to launch in March as a private beta for landlords in Lincoln and surrounding areas.

Aaron Short, one of the three founders, said: “This has been top secret for the 16 months we have been working on it.”

Once the team is satisfied that the product works, the national roll-out will begin.

Short said: “Depending on how our recruitment of Local Lettings Experts goes, we hope to have a complete national presence by the end of 2019.”

He said that recruitment of LLEs has already started, with interest coming from a number of hopefuls, including ex-Purplebricks LPEs.

Short said: “We are looking for the same kind of qualities that Purplebricks look for in their local experts: people of experience, who have entrepreneurial mindsets and are ambitious to help landlords build up their own businesses.

“They will be able to use our platform, which we have built from the ground up, so that they can be free to concentrate on the things they are good at – talking to local landlords, and building up and fostering good relationships to help them maximise their assets.

“When they have got really busy, they will be encouraged to hire their own Community Managers to do tasks such as viewings, check-ins and check-outs.”

Short added: “We don’t see ourselves as either online or hybrid – we don’t like those terms. Instead, we look on ourselves as the next generation letting agent.”

The business, which will start with an emphasis on HMOs, plans on being ‘super-friendly’ to tenants, who Short sees as being long-term generation renters.

They will be able to use the Accommodation platform for finding properties, viewings, submitting tenancy agreements, referencing and payments, and reporting repair issues.

There will also be an emphasis on quality, says Short: “Tenants will be assured of good quality accommodation, and of being treated well by landlords. We inspect every house to ensure it meets the standards we set out for our community of renters.”

There will be no tenant fees to pay, while landlords will be able to choose between two levels of service – part-managed and fully-managed –paying on average £20 per month per lettable room. There will be no let-only service. All the properties will be listed on Rightmove, Zoopla and SpareRoom.

As a business, Accommodation has already raised funding – although Short did not disclose how much. However, he did say that the business is now valued at £3.75m, before launch.

Aged only 23, Short and his co-founders Matthew Meekins and John Lomas – the latter a large portfolio landlord – have been careful to surround themselves with industry-knowledgeable people.

Short bought his first property while at university and let it to students: “It was through this experience that I realised there was a gap in the market for an efficient, streamlined process for landlords. However, technology is not a replacement for a business that is essentially about relationships.”

He says the key business attraction is the “lifetime value of our customers – it’s so much greater than in the sales sector”.

The business does have a website, but it deliberately does not give too much away, and a new website will launch in the New Year.

“We have so far been very careful to keep this under wraps,” said Short.

Accommodation.co.uk