A EweMove business has become the first in the franchise network to bring in revenue of £140,000 in a single month.
EweMove in Basingstoke, Hampshire, was launched in February last year by experienced high street agents Robert Bassett and Mark Holmes.
Bassett was formerly Countrywide regional manager for Surrey and Hampshire and before that branch manager at Romans.
Holmes was previously regional director for the south-east region of Countrywide, and before that was branch manager at Romans’ Land & New Homes.
The pair’s EweMove business has an office on an industrial park on the edge of Basingstoke.
Bassett said that although he and Holmes had had successful high street careers, they had “recognised that the industry was quickly moving towards a very different kind of approach and we wanted to be part of it”.
Holmes said: “We’ve adopted a much more flexible approach to working.
“For us, having a high street branch was less cost-effective considering overheads and rent – especially when we’re promoting ourselves as a service open 24/7, so we opted for an off high street office.
“Being flexible to work from any location means we’re much more responsive to customers, and we’re able to use the technology and systems to streamline our admin and processes.”
The business has grown rapidly, with four fee-earning members of staff appointed – all former branch managers and previous colleagues of Bassett and Holmes.
Below, the record-creating team, from left: Gavin Myers, Grant Turness, Robert Bassett, Sophie Barnard and Mark Holmes
Comments (44)
PeeBee, AKA Rummage4
I’ve lost the thread.What makes you speechless?
No, Sir – NOT “AKA Rummage4”. I speak for myself – when I’m not rendered speechless, that is.
Speechless.
Appropriate words simply do not exist.
As the comment above says, Basingstoke listed £140,000 of new business in one month. But it doesn’t say that they regularly hit 70,80k or more and have a very high completion ratio to the industry. Here is the point a lot of you seem to be missing. Ewemove are not cheap, most Franchisees I know charge 1.2% or above and our focus is on service and communication. Some only want to run a small business with little or no help but there are now quite a few, myself included that run an office and have staff and we are making a very good living thank you. We price alongside the two most expensive agents in our area so accept that all old style agents can learn a thing or two about service and customer care in the home and on the phone, you do not need a shiny high street office to do that but It won’t hurt your business either if your numbers stack up to make it work.
As the CEO of the Plc which owns EweMove I can set the record straight. The £140,000 quoted is the value of the fees that the Basingstoke team would earn if they sell all the stock they have listed in the month. They won’t sell it all but they will sell a lot of it – across EweMove we sell 71% of the stock we list, a commendable result. Even more impressive when you consider we work with a “happy customer guarantee”. We never charge ANY up-front fees and we don’t tie our customers into a sole selling rights contract – they can give short notice and go at any time. So how do we do it? Because we are OBSESSIVE about customer service, every interaction with customers is Net Promoter Score tested, and we list properties at prices we know are achievable based on bank grade valuation reports. Basingstoke EweMove operates out of a Regus serviced office. Once you have a team you probably need a hub office, but you don’t need a high street office, if the technology platform is strong enough, particularly digital marketing. However, what we have learned, rather painfully, since we bought EweMove from David & Glenn is that estate agents have a very particular skill set which it is hard (not impossible) to inculcate in persons from a different background. It’s why we are now completely focused on recruiting the next generation of EweMove franchisees from within the industry.
The headline says…
Record for EweMove as franchisee becomes first to bring in monthly revenue of £140,000
Then the CEO says…
The £140,000 quoted is the value of the fees that the Basingstoke team would earn if they sell all the stock they have listed in the month. They won’t sell it all but they will sell a lot of it
Dear me….does this make any sense?
Taking aside the figures quoted, isn’t a major reason for EweMove releasing this article an attempt to attract and recruit more franchisees into their network?
Completely agree
Can’t be ar5sed to research it, I’m more interested in doing my tea ( ( lamb chops if anyone’s interested ) but in my experience doing what’s claimed on the face of it would involve the top agent in any given area ( with a few exceptions ) exchanging the entire pipeline in a single month.
And any agent worth their weight will tell you that exchanging your entire pipeline in one month, is business suicide…
WMV97
They appear to have 64 properties in their pipeline today, if .@Zoopla listings can be trusted (which is another topic for another day…)
Say you invoice a third of your pipeline in a month – they should be sending out 21 bills. At an average sale price of, say, £300k at “average” Fee value (MyHomeMove figure) of 1.3% that would be £81,900 for the month. Add to that FS & Legal ‘referrals’ and a bit of Lettings wonga, and you’re surely over the ton by a chunk of moolah?
And let’s not forget that the article subject month was their BESTEST EVA! Beg a couple from the month before, borrow a few from the month after…
…and you get to STEAL the limelight on the pages of EYE!
The last two sentences…. brilliant! Love it.
Thank you
I try… sometimes – like a budgie with a busted beak – I succeed.
This is a bizarre claim. and as stated by others nothing to do with jealousy, just frustration that these companies are able to make totally spurious claims with no substantiation or explanation.
In fact EYE should be seeing evidence of such a claim before it gets used as a headline. I don’t get how that’s allowed to be printed without corroboration?? News should be fact based surely.
If £140k is value of instructions income, if they sold them all, then a) that is not revenue and b) they wont sell (complete) on more than 50% currently so the figure is miles out. Revenue is income. What income did they actually bring in? No way is it even close to £140k. Or even £100k.
They cant have a lettings book feeding very much just 15 months in. So unless they have done a huge land deal – it requires a totally unrealistic level of completions. Staggeringly unrealistic. Even more so in this climate.
I don’t have any gripe with anyone being successful. Good luck to one and all – just spare the wildly false claims to lure the gullible or massage your ego. Or evidence your claims and take the plaudits.
Its one or the other, not both.
>The business has grown rapidly, with four fee-earning members of staff appointed – all former branch managers and previous colleagues of Bassett and Holmes.
Well done.
Okay… let’s throw some figures around.
144 listings in 6 months (read elsewhere).
24 per month (avg.)
33 in last 30 days (Zoopla)
£338,883 avg. Asking Price all listings (Zoopla)
Success rate – 70%+ (as stated on EYE in June)
Now for the assumptions:
Achieve 97% of Asking Price.
Fall-throughs don’t affect the numbers as the overall figure is the one that counts, innit?
Sale Fee income = 85% of Gross income (20 to cover small rentals offering, FS & Legals kick-backs)
BUT…
This is their BEST month (we all have them). Say the income is 30% above ‘norm’
The average monthly income therefore £110000
Avg monthly Resi Sales income £94150
SO…
Monthly completions = 18
Sales Fee income = £80000
Average Fee – £4444
Average Fee % – 1.35 (assumes ex-VAT)
Hey – I ain’t knocking it. Far from it. £80+k is a figure that some Agencies won’t make in a year – never mind a month. Not bliddy bad at all, in fact.
But the Fee ain’t a mind-blower when you look at the real figures. One good month (half- and year-ends always seem to bring sales flooding out of the woodwork, don’t they…) is but a swallow – although it’s a prettier one than the rest.
Wonder how it compares with the other main players in Basingstoke – Connells, Gascoigne-Pees, Romans – all with similar registers (and presumably achieving similar KPIs)?
Oh – and there were 1763 sales completed in “Basingstoke” in the last 12 months – 2539 if you extend the search to a 5-mile radius. (credit: Rightmove)
Where do you work as an agent?? 1.35% average fee is much greater than the average UK fee outside the London region. You’re mad if you that isn’t ‘a mind-blower’ as you put it. Most agents would bend over backwards for stock with fees like that. I was a regional for one of the most successful agents in the Midlands (mulit branch independent) the success was measured on volume of stock instructed against volume of stock sold and in turn completed. I don’t understand how the measure can relate to a single month performance as this article suggests and subsequently does nothing to disclose where the figure even comes from!! As I say, just another stupid publicity offering from a doomed online agent (my opinion, not necessarily factual) The article is utter rubbish. As most online related articles seem to be over recent weeks on EYE.
Check out their accounts…..nowhere near as Rosy as it’s been made out to be
“1.35% average fee is much greater than the average UK fee outside the London region.”
Look – I’m not wanting to trade blows with you on this – jeez, I agree with 94.2% of what you say – but please re-read this single sentence and spot where you lose the battle.
1. I work in the North East.
2. Last ‘reliable’ statistic for Fees (MyHomeMove, 2015) stated an “average” of 1.3%.
I don’t consider ONE TWENTIETH OF ONE PERCENT away from that to be “mind-blowing”. And neither should you.
I don’t consider myself to be mad, either. And neither should you. Think of me more as the Yin to your Yang.
Where we both agree, by the way, is that of course this is a ridiculous fluffing up of feathers (or in this instance, teasing out of wool) by an Agency with an agenda.
(make that ANOTHER Agency with an agenda…)
Not all agents charge 1% or less. The ones making real money are charging 2%.
The race to the bottom is not the way to make money. It might hurt your ego tho….
JB43
“Not all agents charge 1% or less.”
True.
“The ones making real money are charging 2%.”
Not necessarily, mon ami.
The ones making real money are, quite simply, those who’s income is more than their costs. An Agent charging 2% at £100k makes £2k Fee (£1666.67 excluding the VAT) If their total costs to sell the property are £0.01 more than that, then they have paid to work.
Confucius he say:
“Agent that sell eighty percent of stock at one percent fee make more money than Agent who sell fifty percent at two.
Agent also less likely to have to #NUKE many-lot 1-star review from trustpilot, also.”
Wise old owl, that Confucius…
This article does 2 things in my opinion. Firstly to those in the industry is doesnt sound right without more depth. Is this completed sales and if so how many. Even if Ewemove were charging £2000 per sale (which i’m sure they are not) this is 70 completions, which seems very very “unrealistic”.
Secondly the general public will see this figure and support what is probably already their opinion that estate agents get paid too much.
Not a smart move this press release
Agree with your first statement and closing line but I think your comment regarding estate agents getting paid too much is utter rubbish. Do you have any idea what the average salary is for an agent?!
Granted, Directors/business owners are paid well but they deserve that and support businesses that have huge overheads and staffing costs so if there is enough for us to be paid well…that is just business – every business director (who is successful) will be remunerated well.
Just an idiotic comment – totally agree with your other statements though!!
WMV97
Not sure what “idiotic comment” it is you’re referring to – the one you seem to have linked to is pretty much on the money.
I think you will find that ArthurHouse02 has an extremely good idea as to what an “average” Estate Agent gets paid.
While we’re on – what figure would you like to put on it?
But would you also like to confirm what is, in your opinion, “the average agent” is? Or what in your opinion the general public think that “Estate Agents” get paid?
Look forward to your response.
To clarify, i dont think agents get paid too much be it at staff level or director level. I think for the work that good estate agents do we probably dont get paid enough. What i am referring to the the publics perception of what we get paid for what we do. The rise of those who shall not be mentioned, Ewemove etc, is part due to the public feeling we get paid a shed load for just dumping a house on RM etc.
With this being the case i feel bragging about a single “office” raking in a record £140,000 in one month without any context on number of sales this covers, add-ons etc to be not only potentially misleading but incredibly naive.
AH02
What do you make of my ‘back-of-a-fag-packet” accounting in the next post down for the wooly figures in the article?
Well it doesn’t take much to look at available jobs in the industry to see what negotiators/valuers/managers get paid. I own a large company but have worked as a negotiator/valuer and regional manager also. Hence my comment. The payscales are relative to the positon. Most good negotiators who have worked for me in the past earn about £25k including all bonuses in this region of the west Midlands (fees are low, average asking prices are only about the UK average). The basics are as low as minimum wage in most places. If they sell houses well, they get paid well. But if they get paid well they’ve done the job they’ve been employed to do (unlike online agents who get paid upfront) it’s relative to the location they operate too… obviously commission in London is far greater. My pay is currently relative to how well the business performs…poor performance, poor pay (dividends as it is when you own a business) I suggest you have a quick look at a recruitment agency if you think estate agents get paid too much. The idotic comment I refer to is that made regarding agents getting paid too much. What is too much??? If they perform well, the pay is justified. Most agents worth their pay are on a no sale, no fee agreement so won’t get paid until the job is complete.
Hope I haven’t made you wait too long for what is a pretty obvious response.
Shame you didnt read my post properly. I’m not saying that we get paid too much i’m saying that the public may feel we get paid too much for what they think we do or dont do. Bragging about ramming £140 grand in a month is not positive spin
Fair point, I retract any negativity.
Totally agree with that too!
So many bitter agents out there… Well done EweMove Basingstoke!!
Not too sure about that ginger beard though…
Nothing bitter at all Kieran.E. The fact is the figures they come out with and comments they make are completely fabricated and don’t mean anything – it’s just a publicity stunt. You don’t see respected agents posting and bragging about their monthly figures (it is highly unprofessional to do so in this monetry manner) Also – what are these figures?? Is it gross income? sales in the pipeline? who knows….it’s just irrelevant. And as for the HeadShepherd – I wouldn’t trust anything that came out of his inexperienced mouth.
Bitter? No.
Angry at the fact these idiots continue to slander the high street agent and then come out with this **** for publicity. YES
Congratulations to Rob, Mark & team. You guys are rocking and rolling and should be proud of what you’ve achieved in such a short space of time. An example of what can be done when talented people work hard. Haters gonna hate.
I’m sure I read somewhere (maybe in the ranting letter) that it was £140k worth of potential income from listing signed in a specific month. Maybe head shepherd #2 can confirm?
I wouldn’t trust anything that muppet says in a public forum…he’ll soon backtrack on his statement!
Hopefully they can now afford a nice High Street shop/ office for all their staff to base themselves when they are not working out of their car boot!
There is a good chance that they don’t live in cars.
1980 called and wants it’s high street shop back
Is that?
* instructions that will generate £140k if they all sell?
* contracts exchanged?
* money banked?
The trouble with all these claims is that they are rarely backed up with a clear explanation
Well done, no mean feat in the current climate
How much is the average fee of Ewemove again?