Are low estate agent fees more important to sellers than anything else?
Choosing the right agent is a big decision for anyone selling their most prized commodity. There’s a lot of pressure to get the best price and sell quickly.
There are plenty of agents for sellers to choose from, with most promising similar results, fantastic marketing and quick turnarounds. As a result, it wouldn’t be a huge surprise if, when it came down to it, the final decision was based on which agent offered the lowest fee.
10,000 surveyed
However, when we analysed the results of the 2022 Property Academy Home Moving Trends Survey, with more than 10,000 home movers expressing their views, we found quite the opposite. In fact, just 11% of sellers include ‘lowest fee’ in their top five reasons for choosing their agent, and only 6% of vendors choose their agent solely for this reason.
Liked, trusted and showed good market knowledge
Instead, the survey reveals that, across all ages and household types, factors like ‘I liked and trusted them’ and ‘They had good market knowledge’ are more important to vendors than the fee they charge.
When asked what the most sought-after attributes were when establishing trust in an agent, respondents rated ‘Listening to and understanding needs’ (73%) and being ‘Courteous and professional’ (72%) in their top two.
The challenge for agents is therefore to convey these attributes to their local market well before someone even considers putting their property on the market. If an agent is already on someone’s radar (for the right reasons), they stand a greater chance of being the first to be contacted for a valuation. This is of even more importance when almost a third of experienced sellers (who have previously sold more than two properties) ask just one agent for a valuation.
It takes a large number of touch points for an agent to break through to that shortlist, and it’s crucial that the conversation you are creating with potential vendors is as relevant to them as possible.
At Dataloft Inform, we work with hundreds of agents to provide the latest property market insights and hyper-local content. By sharing this relevant and useful content, our subscribers create life-long conversations before, during and after working with a vendor. This is done through channels like an agent’s website, email marketing and social media. Subscribers also do activities like targeted door drops and present collateral like market reports to stand out at valuations.
If you’d like to find out more information about the results of the survey or how we can help your estate agency business, email us at inform@dataloft.co.uk
Rory Black | Director, Dataloft