The chairman of online agent Estates Direct, Poundland founder Steve Smith, has slashed £1.5m off the asking price of his home.
He put his 15,000 sq ft mansion on the market for £6.5m a year ago.
He reduced it by £750,000 last March and has now knocked another £750,000 off.
The 13-bedroom house, in Romsley, Shropshire, is now listed as “in excess of £5m”.
Its tasteful features include a fully stocked pub.
Smith first put the property on the market with his own online agency in order to avoid high street estate agency fees.
He said at the time: “If [a high street estate agent] sold my house for £6.5million at 1.5% plus VAT, I’d have to hand over £117,000, which is staggering considering how little they do.
“Doing it online costs me a total of £1,788 so I’ll save £115,212.
“It is the future of property selling so no wonder the high street estate agents hate us.”
https://www.estatesdirect.com/property-details/?propertyidtag=508362_153484S
Comments (12)
A traditional agent would have sold this ages ago – pay peanuts…
We leave more money in sellers’ pockets than online agents even if they charged zero
His inexperienced estate agent, over valued his property. That’s why its not selling, should have used a well established traditional estate agent, with a good network of branches. 🙂
He’s probably best off drowning his sorrows in his fully stocked pub!
Blooming typo!
I meant “You might KNOW how to sell cheap, But you pay estate agents not to.
If an estate agent said his property was potentially able to achieve £6.5m then he should have offered the estate agent 3% however this is probably what really happened.
“Dear Mr Smith. thank you for allowing my team to appraise your property and we are confident we can achieve a price in the region of £2.7m etc etc etc.
So Mr Smith thinks he knows better, puts it on totally overpriced (like everyone tries with a cheap on-line agent) finds out the agent actually does know what he or she is talking about and now has to go through the agonising trial by fire of dropping the price to the point he is either giving it away or simply short selling.
Best bet Mr Smith. Instruct a professional estate agent at a reasonable asking price and when they charge you 1.5% plus VAT just pay up and say thank you.
You might not how to sell cheap, But you pay estate agents not to.
I’ve just sold my place through the agent I work for, and I’ve done pretty much all of the sales chasing myself, on the sale and related purchase. Yes, I got a “mate’s rates” deal of less than 1% + VAT, but I’m happy with the service I got prior to getting on offer, and the main reason I’ve done the chasing is to stop the others in the office wanting to kill me for pestering them all the time!
You get what you pay for Mr Smith! My home was worth a fraction of yours, yet I’ve sold it in a fraction of the time, for less than double what you are being charged by your own company! And for much closer to the original asking price than you, even after reducing the price after I had been on for a couple of months…
Anyone know the company details, registration number, of Estate Direct? It is always worth checking these things out especially with George Osborne reckoning this is the future.
It’s a bit of an oversight that EstateDirect.com doesn’t appear to comply with basic legislation.
Found it, 07382804. 2011-12 was a good year the firm wasn’t worth anything! 2012-13 for a bloke who lives on £20 hand outs from his wife someone else must be doing some serious spending the company dropped over £450k but 2013-2014 things started looking up net worth increased to -£394K
I think there is a lesson here Mr Osborne success in retail doesn’t cross over to service industries!
Well, I am staggered. Surely this online agent will have worked tirelessly and professionally in the best interest of their client – who made the considered choice of using their services and who is clearly someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing?
Did they not provide a carefully considered and well-evidenced valuation followed by a properly planned and executed marketing campaign with high quality brochure, advertising, portal listing, accompanied viewings etc; introduction of the property to their extensive applicant database by means of email, telephone, letter etc; discussing the property with buying agents; regular reporting to the client of the progress (or lack of it) in finding a buyer; ongoing advice as to the state of the market and the current value of the property as conditions change.
Surely the client is entitled to expect this minimum level of service in return for a £1,788 fee to market a multi million pound property?
“If [a high street estate agent] sold my house for £6.5million at 1.5% plus VAT”
Could have got a good agent to do this for 1% + VAT so theres the first smoke and mirrors unravelled and therefore the cost is now down to £65,000 + VAT (if we base it on the original asking price)
Secondly the chances are that the potential buyers for this are not fishing in the cheap and nasty online pool so chances are being missed and potentially a sales might have been achieved at the original asking price……..but you’ll never know Steve!
AT least you can rest easy that when you do eventually sell it, it would have only cost you £1788. Even if you have to drop it to £2m its still only costing £1788. Fantastic.
For a successful business man surely…………………………………
“Considering how little they do!”
How many hours of work has EstatesDirect put into selling this house over a year? Very little by the sound of it, which may be the reason it remains unsold. If perchance a lot of work, then their hourly rate must be below the minimum national wage!
Get real, Steve and use a great high Street estate agency. Always here to help.
Just shows how expensive it can be using an online agent 😉